NHL business

[Strangelove]

Re: Hits to head
Gary Bettman to: Colin Campbell 11/09/2008 03:54 PM

Thanks.
Sent from my Blackberry
Gary Bettman

Colin Campbell

Original Message

From: Colin Campbell

Sent: 11/09/2008 03:52 PM EST

To: Gary Bettman

Subject: Re: Hits to head
were the numbers Kinger used. I am confirming those right now with Kris. We had a hit from
behind last on Toronto (Kotsoplous on Van Ryn). Kotsopoulous received a 5 min penalty
and kicked out ofgame.. Toronto scored. Van Ryan is a woos and soft but he ended up with a broken
nose and broken hand. He should be penalized and suspended for putting himself in a bad position. We
are having a hearing tomorrow for Kotspoulos.

NHL0025473

[Hockey Widow]

He also in one email brings up late hits and banning hits to the head altogether. No one wants it and he goes on to say either does he but they pad their defence just by asking the question so now they can say ya we talked about, ha ha ha. Let the PA deal with that.

[Hockey Widow]

Quick someone find the emails during the Boston series!!

[Island Nucklehead]

McKenzie and Dreger apparently have huge influence, recommending player punishment and whatnot.

McKenzie and Dreger are apparently hugely biased.

Certainly makes you wonder when you see McKenzie's audio clip on TSN today with the headline "No surprise if Keith gets 5 games or less".

Definitely embarrassing for the league, proving that they are the clown show everyone thinks they are.

[Hockey Widow]

Clown show, ya. But the NFL and MLB are no different. They have had more than their share of embarrassing moments. Heck the NBA has had fixgate, and a host of behavioural issues.

They are protectionist rackets. The Comish's job is to protect owner investment, in all leagues, that's first and foremost. They do lip service to everything else. Bonds and McGuire were great for baseball even though everyone knew PED's were involved. I remember tuning in every game to see history!

It's not just hockey or the NHL. It's pro sports, money and power. Bettman cares about the image of the league as far as it affects owners interest. That's his job. He cares about player safety as long as it protects owners return on investment. Not saying he doesn't care about the individual lives involved only that the bigger picture is owners interest. That includes tv, and gate revenue and merchandising. Sugar coat everything, drum up interest, protect the owners.

To be impartial there should be a commish who is term elected by all stake holders. Bettman could stay on in a new role, owner advocate. But that'll never happen!

[SKYO]

Even Chicago's own Tribune doesn't like what Keith did, and expects Duncan Keith to miss part of the playoffs..

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/co ... olumn.html

For such a smart player, Keith did a dumb thing Tuesday night against the Wild when he slashed Charlie Coyle in the face with his stick. Keith recklessly committed a vicious act that made the Stanley Cup a little harder to defend. He made a conscious decision to retaliate against Coyle, the Wild forward who took him to the ground with a trip that constituted interference. Landing hard on his back, Keith lay there for a split second and — in that momentary lapse — decided to swing his stick at Coyle in a blatant attempt to injure the Wild player. The blood dripping down Coyle's crooked nose confirmed Keith's attempt was successful. Had an opponent done something similar to a Hawks player, he would have received the Raffi Torres pariah treatment from the fan base.

That's no way for a Hall of Fame player to respect the game or an opponent. That's crossing the line between going hard and playing dirty. That's unacceptable, especially for a Norris Trophy winner who should have realized the potential repercussions by the league with the playoffs looming.

In other words, the switch the Hawks like to flip once the postseason begins just became harder to find thanks to Keith.

The NHL Department of Player Safety responded Wednesday by announcing Keith was offered an in-person hearing to review his high-sticking penalty — and the league only offers to meet face-to-face when the possible punishment will be a suspension of six games or more. Only five regular-season Hawks games remain.

The hockey math adds up to a significant loss for the Hawks, with Keith likely to miss at least the start of his team's first-round playoff series against the Blues, Stars, Kings or Ducks. Against any of those quality opponents — all good enough to win the West — a Hawks team struggling defensively cannot afford the loss of a player of Keith's caliber even for one game.

[BurningBeard]

Colin Campbell talking to Dreger about a possible Gauthier suspension (after Dreger asked for an inside scoop and suggested he should be suspended).

It is a FINE line and I polled our guys in the room and only one guy thought he should be
suspended and not on the play itself but because he is an assehole.

Good lord.

Campbell also refers to Nonis as "mini-Burkie" in one of the e-mails.

[SKYO]

76ers to become first team to sell an ad space on their jersey -
http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/15559 ... nt-stubhub



They get $5Million bucks a year for that.

$5M per that'll help pay for Lucic or Stamkos new contract with the Canucks. :-p

[Mickey107]

That's not bad! I was afraid they were talkin bout English Premier League style stuff...

[Meds]

76ers to become first team to sell an ad space on their jersey -
http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/15559 ... nt-stubhub



They get $5Million bucks a year for that.

$5M per that'll help pay for Lucic or Stamkos new contract with the Canucks. :-p

Ummmm.....SKYO?

That $5M doesn't go towards extra cap space.

Physical dollars aren't the Canucks problem, the Aquabros have plenty of cash......our problem is cap space (especially if Lou retires on us).

[SKYO]

That's not bad! I was afraid they were talkin bout English Premier League style stuff...

Yeah that's ok in my books, teams always have a variety of patches there or on the shoulders all the time anyways.

$5M per that'll help pay for Lucic or Stamkos new contract with the Canucks. :-p

Ummmm.....SKYO?
That $5M doesn't go towards extra cap space.
Physical dollars aren't the Canucks problem, the Aquabros have plenty of cash......our problem is cap space (especially if Lou retires on us).

Where did I say cap space?? lol
Hey man, extra cash for the mafia always helps ease the burden of buying out contracts etc.

[SKYO]

Salary cap could go down next season

http://www.thehockeynews.com/blog/repor ... xt-season/

Estimating the salary cap can be a tricky thing.

The early indications, back during the GM meetings in December, were that the ceiling could be rising as much as $3 million, but deputy commissioner Bill Daly’s comments earlier this week that the cap could remain “relatively flat” had some believing GMs might not have much extra room to work with come 2016-17. The outlook might be worse than that, though.

According to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, there’s a possibility that the salary cap could actually decrease in 2016-17. The NHLPA has the option to use an escalator that would see the cap increase by five percent, but if they decide against using it, the salary cap could again drop to less than $70 million — a decrease of at least $1.5 million.

“The players were told this week when they met at the NHLPA meetings if they don’t vote to increase the salary cap by five percent, there’s a chance it could go down under $70 million next year,” Friedman said. “Not yet decided, but that’s potentially what they’ve been told.”

Blackhawks would be in deep cap do-do, along with the Kings and BlueJackets.

[Mickey107]

Sorry to hear that.
Did sort of expect it though.
With the poor showing of Canadian teams, our dollar, the TV ratings in the playoffs, it most assuredly points out the importance of teams north of the 49th to get going...

[Topper]

The options for the players are 1) use the accelerator and increase the cap then have escrow roll it all back. 2) don't use the accelerator and have more mid level talent vets working on their Russian language skills.

[Mickey107]

The options for the players are 1) use the accelerator and increase the cap then have escrow roll it all back. 2) don't use the accelerator and have more mid level talent vets working on their Russian language skills.

And that is exactly what's going to happen.
The 2.5 to 3.5 mill per year vets will start leaving.
Probably a temporary situation as ELCs run out.
But then again it could create a scenario where a young player has 3 years only to make the jump from EL to 5 mill per year or more.
That will weed things out big time.
I can see teams wanting to keep their drafts and prospects in the minors, junior or college at least an extra year.