StormJH1

You listed a lot there, and some of them go further back and are good examples. I think the Krupp situation is a good example of a "mistake", at least in retrospect. Of course, poaching a 6'6" right-handed defenseman from your bitter rival probably seemed like a great idea at the time. He had missed a good amount of time previously due to injury, but predicting the whole thing with the dog sledding while he was supposed to be rehabbing (and the grievance) would have been hard to foresee. http://blog.mlive.com/its-just-sports/2009/07/best_of_the_worst_red_wings_no_9.html
But the "failing to have a Lidstrom succession plan" one, which you are far from the only person to suggest, just makes me chuckle because you CAN'T find another Lidstrom, and it's not like having 2 "good" defenseman is the same as having 1 "elite" one that logs 25 minutes a game and virtually never screws up (not to mention quarterbacking the power play).
Plus, unless you're talking about Chris Pronger, Scott Niedermayer, or Zdeno Chara, it's really pretty hard to find examples of defenseman that are so impactful you could basically plug them into any team and have an instant defensive powerhouse. No better example of that right now than what is happening with Ryan Suter in Minnesota. I was among the people who really wanted him here, but it turns out that when your partner is Tom Gilbert instead of Shea Weber, suddenly your defense doesn't look as stellar.
The problem the Wings had with replacing the defensive corps is the same they have all over the team. Other than Suter, there really was no "free agency" fix for a top-tier defenseman in the offseason. You could argue that Holland should have traded for one, but since the Red Wings rarely have draft picks above the 20th pick, it's not like the Red Wings have elite caliber prospects like a Hodgson or Kassian that you see swapped around for considerable value before their careers have taken off (in that case, they were swapped for each other). If the Wings are lucky enough to develop the next Datsyuk or Zetterberg, that won't be apparent to the league until they're already proven pros, at which point we'd probably want to keep that player.
And even though the Wings seem to trade their 1st rounder basically every other year, it's almost a guaranteed low first rounder, so the returns are more like Kyle Quincey than Jonas Brodin or Victor Hedman.
Nobody doubts that the defense is a problem, but to call it a "mistake" seems a bit unfair, or unrealistic.

You listed a lot there, and some of them go further back and are good examples. I think the Krupp situation is a good example of a "mistake", at least in retrospect. Of course, poaching a 6'6" right-handed defenseman from your bitter rival probably seemed like a great idea at the time. He had missed a good amount of time previously due to injury, but predicting the whole thing with the dog sledding while he was supposed to be rehabbing (and the grievance) would have been hard to foresee. http://blog.mlive.com/its-just-sports/2009/07/best_of_the_worst_red_wings_no_9.html
But the "failing to have a Lidstrom succession plan" one, which you are far from the only person to suggest, just makes me chuckle because you CAN'T find another Lidstrom, and it's not like having 2 "good" defenseman is the same as having 1 "elite" one that logs 25 minutes a game and virtually never screws up (not to mention quarterbacking the power play).
Plus, unless you're talking about Chris Pronger, Scott Niedermayer, or Zdeno Chara, it's really pretty hard to find examples of defenseman that are so impactful you could basically plug them into any team and have an instant defensive powerhouse. No better example of that right now than what is happening with Ryan Suter in Minnesota. I was among the people who really wanted him here, but it turns out that when your partner is Tom Gilbert instead of Shea Weber, suddenly your defense doesn't look as stellar.
The problem the Wings had with replacing the defensive corps is the same they have all over the team. Other than Suter, there really was no "free agency" fix for a top-tier defenseman in the offseason. You could argue that Holland should have traded for one, but since the Red Wings rarely have draft picks above the 20th pick, it's not like the Red Wings have elite caliber prospects like a Hodgson or Kassian that you see swapped around for considerable value before their careers have taken off (in that case, they were swapped for each other). If the Wings are lucky enough to develop the next Datsyuk or Zetterberg, that won't be apparent to the league until they're already proven pros, at which point we'd probably want to keep that player.
And even though the Wings seem to trade their 1st rounder basically every other year, it's almost a guaranteed low first rounder, so the returns are more like Kyle Quincey than Jonas Brodin or Victor Hedman.
Nobody doubts that the defense is a problem, but to call it a "mistake" seems a bit unfair, or unrealistic.

When they show the highlight package for Datsyuk's career, I have to think that goal will be included in there...right after his patented shootout move on Turco, kicking the puck the Z for the empty netter, and any number of other blind passes, take aways or other exceptional plays you could choose from.
I really think that his offense from game-to-game this year has been better at age 34 than it ever has been. I'm not saying he'll be on a record goals/assist pace (the lockout ruined the significance of those numbers anyway), but he just seems involved in setting up and finishing more consistently than I can ever remember. The brilliant thing about him is that he doesn't do it with superhuman speed or a 100 mph slapshot. In Datsyuk and Larionov, the Wings have had two of the most cerebral tacticians the game has ever seen, which is why this generation of fans is truly spoiled, even if we don't win a Cup every 5 years.
Unless he re-signs, which I don't expect him to do in advance, 2014 really could be his last year in the NHL. I sure hope it's not, but I certainly wouldn't fault him for whatever he wants to do. Just make sure you appreciate what you're seeing, because we'll be trying to explain to our kids in 10 or 20 years how this guy who never had a 100-pt season or scored more than 32 goals in a year was maybe the most special player we ever watched.

When they show the highlight package for Datsyuk's career, I have to think that goal will be included in there...right after his patented shootout move on Turco, kicking the puck the Z for the empty netter, and any number of other blind passes, take aways or other exceptional plays you could choose from.
I really think that his offense from game-to-game this year has been better at age 34 than it ever has been. I'm not saying he'll be on a record goals/assist pace (the lockout ruined the significance of those numbers anyway), but he just seems involved in setting up and finishing more consistently than I can ever remember. The brilliant thing about him is that he doesn't do it with superhuman speed or a 100 mph slapshot. In Datsyuk and Larionov, the Wings have had two of the most cerebral tacticians the game has ever seen, which is why this generation of fans is truly spoiled, even if we don't win a Cup every 5 years.
Unless he re-signs, which I don't expect him to do in advance, 2014 really could be his last year in the NHL. I sure hope it's not, but I certainly wouldn't fault him for whatever he wants to do. Just make sure you appreciate what you're seeing, because we'll be trying to explain to our kids in 10 or 20 years how this guy who never had a 100-pt season or scored more than 32 goals in a year was maybe the most special player we ever watched.

When they show the highlight package for Datsyuk's career, I have to think that goal will be included in there...right after his patented shootout move on Turco, kicking the puck the Z for the empty netter, and any number of other blind passes, take aways or other exceptional plays you could choose from.
I really think that his offense from game-to-game this year has been better at age 34 than it ever has been. I'm not saying he'll be on a record goals/assist pace (the lockout ruined the significance of those numbers anyway), but he just seems involved in setting up and finishing more consistently than I can ever remember. The brilliant thing about him is that he doesn't do it with superhuman speed or a 100 mph slapshot. In Datsyuk and Larionov, the Wings have had two of the most cerebral tacticians the game has ever seen, which is why this generation of fans is truly spoiled, even if we don't win a Cup every 5 years.
Unless he re-signs, which I don't expect him to do in advance, 2014 really could be his last year in the NHL. I sure hope it's not, but I certainly wouldn't fault him for whatever he wants to do. Just make sure you appreciate what you're seeing, because we'll be trying to explain to our kids in 10 or 20 years how this guy who never had a 100-pt season or scored more than 32 goals in a year was maybe the most special player we ever watched.

The past criticisms of Ericsson's game were entirely fair. It might be that we had unreasonably high expectations for him based on how he played in the '09 Playoffs paired with Lidstrom. There were many examples from 2009-12 of poor positioning, total lack of offensive involvement, and a physical dimension to his game that was disappointing given his size.
That being said, his play this season has been outstanding, and is finally worth the contract that made LGW collectively groan when it was signed. Of course, being surrounded by other crappier defensemen probably helps the perception. But his breakout passes have been excellent, and he's always had a hard shot, it's just that his hands of stone usually render it moot. And there were some key decisions in that Kings game Sunday where he jumped on passes and diffuse some potential disasters on defense.
I think one problem that Ericsson had was that he broke in with the Wings already in his mid-20's, and was perceived as being "over-ripe" (a 2002 draft pick that didn't debut until 2008). But he was also a converted forward, and many tall defenseman (Chara, even Hal Gill to an extent) seem to struggle figuring things out until they've been in the league for several years. My point is simply that maybe Ericsson (who just turned 28) is on a different developmental scale. Whatever the case, if he kept up this level of play for the rest of the year, I think we'd be thrilled.

While you obviously hope for that to happen, I completely disagree with you in the following respect: If the Red Wings knew Pavel Datsyuk was going to be Pavel Datsyuk, there's no way in heck they let him fall to #171. The two players drafted by Detroit AHEAD of Datsyuk were Carl Steen (#142, played in the Swedish league and never came over to North America) and Adam DeLeeuw (#151, Canadian Junior player who never played in the NHL). It's one thing to avoid overdrafting a guy, but if they had any clue Datsyuk would become half of what he turned out to be, why were they drafting other North Americans and Europeans ahead of him?
http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/pdisplay.php?pid=31765
You are correct that hockey seems to have a lot of "hidden gems", but the reasons for that in the 90's were different than they are now. Heading into the Nagano Olympic games (first with professional players), it was still very much assumed that Canada and Russia were the talent powerhouses of the world. Globalization and the internet have diminished the chances that Hakan Andersson wanders into some European rink and sees some prodigy that nobody else has even heard of. Also, the profile of many other leagues not named the NHL or KHL has increased greatly following Olympic play and the 2004-05 lockout. In addition to Yzerman and all the free agents, the Wings were built by the head start we seemed to have in spotting (and smuggling) Russians in the late 80's and early 90's, and Swedes before those players were fully appreciated (Swedes being a solid foundation of the '08 team). I'm not sure there's an "untapped" market that the Wings can exploit now, but we will see.
Plus, you have to keep in mind the type of players that Datsuk and Zetterberg are. They are undeniable talents, but they are also both very unselfish, 2-way players. Neither of them possess a 100 mph slapshot, or blazing speed. They aren't flashy players that blow away the competition like Pavel Bure on CSKA Moscow. It takes a lot of foresight, but even more luck, to find a complete player whose overall intelligence and feel for the game that give them the edge at lower levels will also make them elite players as grown men in the NHL. Guys with one particular elite skill, such as world-class speed like Andreas Athanasiou, don't make it past the 3rd or 4th round, even if they tons of other holes in their game.
Also, I don't think NHL GM's do draft players thinking that every one is going to be a star. Drew Miller draft position (with ANA, not DET) was comparable to Datsyuk's, but I don't think anybody looked at the guy and thought: "here's a potential Hart candidate". I think the hope at that late round was that he became a useful bottom-6 forward, which is basically how he turned out.

Excited to see him play (and glad it's not McCollum), but please everybody keep their expectations in check. This is not some overripe Jimmy Howard type working his way through the system - this kid is 20. And defense in front of him has been suspect to the point where even Jimmy has a 3.00-ish GAA.
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Excited to see him play (and glad it's not McCollum), but please everybody keep their expectations in check. This is not some overripe Jimmy Howard type working his way through the system - this kid is 20. And defense in front of him has been suspect to the point where even Jimmy has a 3.00-ish GAA.
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Any Wings fan who can tell you with a straight face that they don't have respect for Illitch is absolutely nuts. He's the definition of a "fan-owner" and his businesses have been extremely important in providing jobs, interest, and morale to a city that is about as dysfunctional as it gets, as anyone who's ever lived anywhere else would tell you. He basically spent the Tigers out of the cellar. Four Cups, Six SCF appearances, and two decades of consecutive Playoff appearance for a team that doesn't have a single draft pick higher than #19 overall (IIRC) on its roster. I'm 31 now, and if you take the Tigers, the Red Wings, and even friggin Little Caesar's Pizza away, I'm not even sure I recognize my childhood.

Any Wings fan who can tell you with a straight face that they don't have respect for Illitch is absolutely nuts. He's the definition of a "fan-owner" and his businesses have been extremely important in providing jobs, interest, and morale to a city that is about as dysfunctional as it gets, as anyone who's ever lived anywhere else would tell you. He basically spent the Tigers out of the cellar. Four Cups, Six SCF appearances, and two decades of consecutive Playoff appearance for a team that doesn't have a single draft pick higher than #19 overall (IIRC) on its roster. I'm 31 now, and if you take the Tigers, the Red Wings, and even friggin Little Caesar's Pizza away, I'm not even sure I recognize my childhood.

Any Wings fan who can tell you with a straight face that they don't have respect for Illitch is absolutely nuts. He's the definition of a "fan-owner" and his businesses have been extremely important in providing jobs, interest, and morale to a city that is about as dysfunctional as it gets, as anyone who's ever lived anywhere else would tell you. He basically spent the Tigers out of the cellar. Four Cups, Six SCF appearances, and two decades of consecutive Playoff appearance for a team that doesn't have a single draft pick higher than #19 overall (IIRC) on its roster. I'm 31 now, and if you take the Tigers, the Red Wings, and even friggin Little Caesar's Pizza away, I'm not even sure I recognize my childhood.

Any Wings fan who can tell you with a straight face that they don't have respect for Illitch is absolutely nuts. He's the definition of a "fan-owner" and his businesses have been extremely important in providing jobs, interest, and morale to a city that is about as dysfunctional as it gets, as anyone who's ever lived anywhere else would tell you. He basically spent the Tigers out of the cellar. Four Cups, Six SCF appearances, and two decades of consecutive Playoff appearance for a team that doesn't have a single draft pick higher than #19 overall (IIRC) on its roster. I'm 31 now, and if you take the Tigers, the Red Wings, and even friggin Little Caesar's Pizza away, I'm not even sure I recognize my childhood.

I live in Minnesota. Suter has been awful and the Wild fans know it, but I think they're trying to be patient with it based on his track record. It's not like Suter was total garbage on the U.S. Olympic team, I thought he was quite good.
The Wild have a rookie, Jonas Brodin, who looks like a stud. He's decent-sized, skilled with the puck, and already playing 21 minutes a night, almost by default.
Tom Gilbert was acquired in a trade for fan favorite Nick Schultz last year that stunned everyone, and Gilbert has been a better fit with this year's more skilled set of forwards.
Zach Parise has actually been as good or better than advertised. As long as he stays healthy, his leadership and work rate are going to keep up his effectiveness, even if the scoring dries up now and then. Plus, he's the local guy who came home, so the Minnesotans love him for that anyway.
But the shocking reality for the Wild is that they're more than a decade in and they've arguably never had a shutdown "Top 2" defenseman in franchise history. They had Brent Burns, but he was more interesting for his offensive rushes and willingness to ignore Lemaire's trap system. Other guys, like Cam Barker, were supposed to anchor the D unit, and completely flamed out. So there has to be some concern that Suter isn't the guy they thought he was, but I'm sure he'll turn it around over time.

33 years old, left handed shot, 6'4" 205lb, but pretty limited playing time the past few years. I have only vague knowledge of him from being on the Ducks.
But I guess it's a warm body with some size an NHL experience, right?

I'm one of the "undercover LGW'ers" living in Minnesota, the fan base here just really annoys me. Obviously, they know the sport itself, or they wouldn't bother taking their kids to all those 6am practices and obsessing over WCHA games with the Golden Gophers. But given that they had no hockey here from 1993-99 (an era of DRAMATIC change in the NHL), and then Lemaire trapped and dumped his way to 8 terribly boring seasons when they got the Wild...it's almost like their impressions of the professional game are locked in some time capsule from the 1970's. When Slap Shot and the Minnesota North Stars are your reference points for the NHL, it explains whey they always need a super-goon here - from Boogaard (R.I.P.) to John Scott to Zenon Konopka.
People need to keep in mind that the Wild were as bad as they were for a reason last year. They had the NHL's best record for, like, 20 games, and then were AWFUL. I think their 2nd half record was worse than Columbus last year. The defensive corps is young and undersized. Adding a horse like Suter helps, but I always thought Weber was clearly superior out of those two, and they always played together. So how much do we really know about Suter?
Parise is like the messiah here - they should've just given him the "C" and bumped Koivu down to an "A" because it seems inevitable anyway. Homegrown kid comes home, and his dad played for the North Stars for parts of 8 seasons. People assumed here that Parise would sign during LAST season, which made it more annoying when it actually happened. But at least with Parise, you understand the appeal. The Wings needed Suter, and he came to Minnesota just to follow Parise and because of his wife. I've taken to calling him "Becky" around my Wild fans, let's see how long before they pick up on it.
I think the Wild are a better team than they were before, but their first two opponents weren't world beaters, and things are screwy all over the league because of the quick start. I still believe that you can't make a bad team good just by adding a player (or two). (See 2001 Capitals, New York Rangers since 1995). Minnesota will likely get better, but mostly because of their revamped farm system, which went from horrible two years ago to one of the better ones in hockey now.

I'm one of the "undercover LGW'ers" living in Minnesota, the fan base here just really annoys me. Obviously, they know the sport itself, or they wouldn't bother taking their kids to all those 6am practices and obsessing over WCHA games with the Golden Gophers. But given that they had no hockey here from 1993-99 (an era of DRAMATIC change in the NHL), and then Lemaire trapped and dumped his way to 8 terribly boring seasons when they got the Wild...it's almost like their impressions of the professional game are locked in some time capsule from the 1970's. When Slap Shot and the Minnesota North Stars are your reference points for the NHL, it explains whey they always need a super-goon here - from Boogaard (R.I.P.) to John Scott to Zenon Konopka.
People need to keep in mind that the Wild were as bad as they were for a reason last year. They had the NHL's best record for, like, 20 games, and then were AWFUL. I think their 2nd half record was worse than Columbus last year. The defensive corps is young and undersized. Adding a horse like Suter helps, but I always thought Weber was clearly superior out of those two, and they always played together. So how much do we really know about Suter?
Parise is like the messiah here - they should've just given him the "C" and bumped Koivu down to an "A" because it seems inevitable anyway. Homegrown kid comes home, and his dad played for the North Stars for parts of 8 seasons. People assumed here that Parise would sign during LAST season, which made it more annoying when it actually happened. But at least with Parise, you understand the appeal. The Wings needed Suter, and he came to Minnesota just to follow Parise and because of his wife. I've taken to calling him "Becky" around my Wild fans, let's see how long before they pick up on it.
I think the Wild are a better team than they were before, but their first two opponents weren't world beaters, and things are screwy all over the league because of the quick start. I still believe that you can't make a bad team good just by adding a player (or two). (See 2001 Capitals, New York Rangers since 1995). Minnesota will likely get better, but mostly because of their revamped farm system, which went from horrible two years ago to one of the better ones in hockey now.

I'm one of the "undercover LGW'ers" living in Minnesota, the fan base here just really annoys me. Obviously, they know the sport itself, or they wouldn't bother taking their kids to all those 6am practices and obsessing over WCHA games with the Golden Gophers. But given that they had no hockey here from 1993-99 (an era of DRAMATIC change in the NHL), and then Lemaire trapped and dumped his way to 8 terribly boring seasons when they got the Wild...it's almost like their impressions of the professional game are locked in some time capsule from the 1970's. When Slap Shot and the Minnesota North Stars are your reference points for the NHL, it explains whey they always need a super-goon here - from Boogaard (R.I.P.) to John Scott to Zenon Konopka.
People need to keep in mind that the Wild were as bad as they were for a reason last year. They had the NHL's best record for, like, 20 games, and then were AWFUL. I think their 2nd half record was worse than Columbus last year. The defensive corps is young and undersized. Adding a horse like Suter helps, but I always thought Weber was clearly superior out of those two, and they always played together. So how much do we really know about Suter?
Parise is like the messiah here - they should've just given him the "C" and bumped Koivu down to an "A" because it seems inevitable anyway. Homegrown kid comes home, and his dad played for the North Stars for parts of 8 seasons. People assumed here that Parise would sign during LAST season, which made it more annoying when it actually happened. But at least with Parise, you understand the appeal. The Wings needed Suter, and he came to Minnesota just to follow Parise and because of his wife. I've taken to calling him "Becky" around my Wild fans, let's see how long before they pick up on it.
I think the Wild are a better team than they were before, but their first two opponents weren't world beaters, and things are screwy all over the league because of the quick start. I still believe that you can't make a bad team good just by adding a player (or two). (See 2001 Capitals, New York Rangers since 1995). Minnesota will likely get better, but mostly because of their revamped farm system, which went from horrible two years ago to one of the better ones in hockey now.

Jesus. Great, half our farm system has a concussion now. Mrazek got beaten to a pulp - love how the ref slid his lifeless corpse away from the other goalie.

Also, what the hell was that siren going off in the background? Is that some sort of signal for everyone to pretend they're in "Slap Shot"?
Great call on that Islanders/Pens brawl by @stevkrause above. The teams with the "best fighters" are usually the teams in the bottom half of the standings. Probably because you have to offer some raw meat for the fairweather fans to chew on.

I'm also a Wings fan in Minnesota. The national games for Detroit are almost half the season this year, but I decided to try out GameCenter anyway. But yes, it's a bummer for people that don't even have the cable subscription that their streaming options are dictated by the cable providers they could have gotten the game on. I think a couple of the games are NBC on the weekend, so presumably you could see those, but NBC Sports Network and NHL Network are a no.
Guess we'll find out tomorrow. I don't understand why there should be any issues given that it's not even like these are "new" apps. They should have been ready in October and just "flipped the switch", but I guess not.

PROTECT THE SHIELD!!!
This doesn't really fit here, but I just felt like yelling it out.

Brilliant. I think the bulk of the hockey-following public really has lost touch with this debate. They hear little bits and pieces of another "concession" by the owners, and when a deal doesn't happen the next day, it must be because Fehr's an *******.
There is no "negotiation" here. This is more like a hostage situation where Bettman has kidnapped little bits and pieces of what the players already had, and letting them out piece by piece. At the end of the day, if he's only taking and not giving back, he's still the aggressor in all of this.
Player salaries did not become inflated (AGAIN) because the players are "greedy" or "overpaid". The salaries went up because the 2005 CBA and its salary cap that the OWNERS unilaterally wanted and forced upon the NHLPA is fundamentally broken. To put the salary cap and floor so close together and to raise the cap so aggressively so that it nearly doubled in the course of 7 years is absurd. The struggling market teams literally HAD to start overpaying mid-level guys to even meet the salary floor. It's not like Crosby and Ovechkin are readily available on the free agent market. You fill out your team and keep your budget up by paying way too much for Jeff Finger, Mike Cammeileri, or Ville Leino.
And worst of all, the same owners who now say they're all losing money were going out of their way to pay more ACTUAL money than the salary cap apparently allows. How do you expect the NHLPA to "give in", given that total lack of credibility on the other side?

I know what you're saying, but I'd hardly call it generous to agree to honor a portion of the contract you've decided not to pay in full, some of which were signed only months ago.
My understanding is they tried a similar move in the NBA lockout (which isn't surprising since all 4 major sports are repped by the same law firm in CBA negotiations) and it got quickly shot down. While they NBA players agreed to 50/50, they play in a league with a soft cap and luxury tax and had the owners make a large increase in revenue sharing.
All sports are different, but the NBA is a relatively close business to the NHL. And in comparison, the NHL players are getting hammered in this negotiation, in great part due to the sins of the owners.
And of the things that benefit players listed in the article:
1) artificially inflate the salary cap in Year 1 so teams don’t have to trade or release players;
That helps the owners just as much for teams to get under the cap. And I would hardly call that a benefit to players, other than things could have been much worse. They're having their salaries cut back and the cap further restricted. Not waiving players isn't a benefit offered to the players. It just means the owners didn't make things even worse for them.
This is the problem I have with the logic of the league side. Because of the owners ridiculous first proposal, Bettman keeps claiming all they've done is concede. Starting at an insane point and moving towards something reasonable, however, is not really a concession. It just means you've actually decided to negotiate in good faith. Fehr should have started by taking the cap off the table, or increasing player share to 70%. Then he could have "conceded" to allowing the cap be in play again. Or having the percentage come down to 60%.
At best, this one's a wash.
2) trade player salary and cap charges in trades (this is something both teams and players have wanted);
probably benefits owners more in that they can dump the awful deals they've made. At best, also a wash.
3) eliminate re-entry waivers;
I'd say wash, but I may be missing something on how this benefits players more than owners because I don't know all the ins and outs. Teams being able to send players down without potentially losing them is a benefit.
4) Increase revenue sharing with further increases as revenues grow, and the top grossing teams making the biggest contributions (revenue sharing is something Don Fehr is passionate about; wants it so the teams that really need assistance are assisted);
This helps the league and unlike anything the owners have proposed, actually addresses the fundamental problem in the league's economic structure. Definitely a wash.
5) Introduction of appeal rights to a neutral third-party arbitrator in cases involving on- and- off-ice discipline (player-proposed wish).
This one I don't know much about but I initially read somewhere it would probably be a very rare circumstance.
Taken in total, none of those even come close to moving from 57 to 50% in salary and giving up all the contracting rights the players will need to in order to make a deal.
Negotiations are give and take. The starting point for who determining who is conceding something is the last CBA, not the first ridiculous proposal the NHL made. Bettman keeps trying this slight of hand and it seems to be working on people.

That second point is what I think the majority of people I argue with don't seem to understand. To solve a problem, your solution actually has to address the root cause of that problem. Otherwise, it's like trying to bandage on your finger to cure a headache - it doesn't make any sense.
In 2004/05, there was an idea that player salaries had gotten out of control. Even thought the fans personally identified with the players more than a bunch of suits who own and operate the teams, public sentiment was largely on the side of the owners. A lot of people, myself included, assumed that if you put a reasonable cap in place, ALL teams would have to spend more responsibly. More importantly, the disparity in budget between the "haves" and "have nots", by definition could not be more than $16 million (difference between cap floor and cap ceiling).
The new CBA really could have succeeded. But two things happened between 2005 and 2012 that really destroyed any chance for smaller markets to compete again. The first was that the revenues of the game grew, which meant that the cap increased:

Raise your hand if you really thought we would nearly DOUBLE the salary cap by 2012 (oh, and by the way, in the midst of a massive worldwide recession). Oh, and by the way, teams like the Detroit Red Wings, who were derisively referred to as the "Yankees" of the NHL, actually didn't spend more than the current salary cap amount before the new CBA, except for one season (2003-04). That "all-star" team that one the 2001-02 Cup with something like 11 Hall of Famers on it? Their payroll of $66 million would've fit easily into the Cap for the 2012-13 season. Of course, the problem was getting worse and worse without a Cap, and I agreed at the time that Salary Cap was necessary. Unfortunately, the implementation of that did nothing to slow the increase of salaries. It simply reset the clock for a few years, which is necessary anyway after you sit out a whole season and disillusion much of your fanbase.
The second thing that happened, of course, was the backdiving contracts and owners/GM's figuring out ways to spend more on players than the team's cap figure would seem to imply. This is significant financially because if you're handing out money to minor league stashes, bonuses, and actual payments to players larger than their cap hit would suggest, then the salary cap really isn't doing much to limit spending, which was supposed to be the whole point of this fiscal responsibility push in 2004-05 in the first place.
Long story short, the system was fundamentally flawed, and the combination of the increased cap and "cheater" contracts that payed more than they appear to led to sustained spending on players. Those problems do need to be fixed so that spending can't get out of control again.
But if you're Phoenix, or Nashville, or Dallas, or whatever...people still need to want to BUY your product, or you'll never make money like the big boys. Even worse, the CBA that is supposed to help all teams by controlling spending actually hurts franchises by putting a cap FLOOR on those teams. Many of those franchises are going to draw 10,000 to 12,000 per game whether they spend $25 million or $50 million on payroll. There just aren't enough fans to support the product long-term in those markets, and that has nothing to do with the players or how much revenue they get.

That second point is what I think the majority of people I argue with don't seem to understand. To solve a problem, your solution actually has to address the root cause of that problem. Otherwise, it's like trying to bandage on your finger to cure a headache - it doesn't make any sense.
In 2004/05, there was an idea that player salaries had gotten out of control. Even thought the fans personally identified with the players more than a bunch of suits who own and operate the teams, public sentiment was largely on the side of the owners. A lot of people, myself included, assumed that if you put a reasonable cap in place, ALL teams would have to spend more responsibly. More importantly, the disparity in budget between the "haves" and "have nots", by definition could not be more than $16 million (difference between cap floor and cap ceiling).
The new CBA really could have succeeded. But two things happened between 2005 and 2012 that really destroyed any chance for smaller markets to compete again. The first was that the revenues of the game grew, which meant that the cap increased:

Raise your hand if you really thought we would nearly DOUBLE the salary cap by 2012 (oh, and by the way, in the midst of a massive worldwide recession). Oh, and by the way, teams like the Detroit Red Wings, who were derisively referred to as the "Yankees" of the NHL, actually didn't spend more than the current salary cap amount before the new CBA, except for one season (2003-04). That "all-star" team that one the 2001-02 Cup with something like 11 Hall of Famers on it? Their payroll of $66 million would've fit easily into the Cap for the 2012-13 season. Of course, the problem was getting worse and worse without a Cap, and I agreed at the time that Salary Cap was necessary. Unfortunately, the implementation of that did nothing to slow the increase of salaries. It simply reset the clock for a few years, which is necessary anyway after you sit out a whole season and disillusion much of your fanbase.
The second thing that happened, of course, was the backdiving contracts and owners/GM's figuring out ways to spend more on players than the team's cap figure would seem to imply. This is significant financially because if you're handing out money to minor league stashes, bonuses, and actual payments to players larger than their cap hit would suggest, then the salary cap really isn't doing much to limit spending, which was supposed to be the whole point of this fiscal responsibility push in 2004-05 in the first place.
Long story short, the system was fundamentally flawed, and the combination of the increased cap and "cheater" contracts that payed more than they appear to led to sustained spending on players. Those problems do need to be fixed so that spending can't get out of control again.
But if you're Phoenix, or Nashville, or Dallas, or whatever...people still need to want to BUY your product, or you'll never make money like the big boys. Even worse, the CBA that is supposed to help all teams by controlling spending actually hurts franchises by putting a cap FLOOR on those teams. Many of those franchises are going to draw 10,000 to 12,000 per game whether they spend $25 million or $50 million on payroll. There just aren't enough fans to support the product long-term in those markets, and that has nothing to do with the players or how much revenue they get.