13dats 1 Report post Posted June 26, 2008 The National Hockey League and the National Hockey League Players’ Association announced today that the Team Payroll Range established for the 2008-09 League Year, pursuant to the Collective Bargaining Agreement, provides for a Lower Limit of $40.7 million, an Adjusted Midpoint of $48.7 million and an Upper Limit of $56.7 million. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
NeverForgetMac25 483 Report post Posted June 26, 2008 On the high end of $56 million! Nice! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
amberlynn25 9 Report post Posted June 26, 2008 nice Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Frozen-Man 144 Report post Posted June 26, 2008 That's higher than I had heard it was going to be. That good news for the Wings (and good news about the financial state of the NHL as a whole). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
StevieY9802 6 Report post Posted June 26, 2008 This isn't good for the bottom teams. I also want to know how much of this is ticket prices. Last year, 06-07, accordin to this article http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/55148 ticket prices went up 5.7% league wide while paid attendance only went 0.2%. A certain someone in here will try to throw stats at you and say the league isn't sturggling and the league needs to expand but if this is just because ticket prices went up again and attendance barely did that's not really good news. LA was running in the red last year I heard whats gonna happen now? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
betterREDthandead 58 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 This isn't good for the bottom teams. I also want to know how much of this is ticket prices. Last year, 06-07, accordin to this article http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/55148 ticket prices went up 5.7% league wide while paid attendance only went 0.2%. A certain someone in here will try to throw stats at you and say the league isn't sturggling and the league needs to expand but if this is just because ticket prices went up again and attendance barely did that's not really good news. LA was running in the red last year I heard whats gonna happen now? Why is that bad news for the league? If people will pay more to see your product, that's a good thing for the league. Having both attendance and ticket prices go up means that there's still untapped demand out there - check the ol' supply and demand curve. That's a plus. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Bad Andy 0 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 Why is that bad news for the league? If people will pay more to see your product, that's a good thing for the league. Having both attendance and ticket prices go up means that there's still untapped demand out there - check the ol' supply and demand curve. That's a plus. It's bad news because it limits the fan base to only those who can afford to go, which is usually not a casual type of fan. Someone who doesn't watch a great deal of hockey is less inclined to buy a $75+ seat when they can spend 1/3 of that or less at another event and get as much enjoyment out of it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
thedisappearer 291 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 It's bad news because it limits the fan base to only those who can afford to go, which is usually not a casual type of fan. Someone who doesn't watch a great deal of hockey is less inclined to buy a $75+ seat when they can spend 1/3 of that or less at another event and get as much enjoyment out of it. More people are paying more money to see hockey. Sure, we'd like even more people to go and ticket prices stay the same, but welcome to capitalism. Hell, it's not even true capitalism with the salary cap, but you get my point. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
eva unit zero 271 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 This isn't good for the bottom teams. I also want to know how much of this is ticket prices. Last year, 06-07, accordin to this article http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/55148 ticket prices went up 5.7% league wide while paid attendance only went 0.2%. A certain someone in here will try to throw stats at you and say the league isn't sturggling and the league needs to expand but if this is just because ticket prices went up again and attendance barely did that's not really good news. LA was running in the red last year I heard whats gonna happen now? I can't help but feel targeted by that statement... But my response would simply be that the small market teams are covered by revenue sharing. As far as LA running in the red....after the lockout, the Kings franchise was seeing annual revenues of $100m. In other words...if LA is in the red...then they should be replacing their management, because it would mean that they were paying non-player costs upwards of $50m in a league where player costs were capped at about $50m. Given that player costs are capped at approximately 60% of revenues, that would mean the Kings were horribly mismanaging their expenses. Which ultimately doesn't make me feel that the NHL is at fault for their inability to survive financially, as obviously there are teams with lower revenue streams which are not in the red, and the Kings cannot use their results to justify any kind of excessive spending. In other words... If the Kings are in the red, it's not the fault of anyone but the Kings. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
eva unit zero 271 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 Well, now that we have a cap number... The Wings have ten forwards, five defensemen, and one goaltender signed for a total cap hit of $39.523m. To this number, we will be adding three forwards, three defensemen, and one goaltender for a total cap hit of no more than $16.177m, so that we have the $1m 'wiggle room' Holland likes to have. Players likely to be included in that group: F Valtteri Filppula $1.2m F Darren McCarty $500k D Chris Chelios $800k D Kyle Quincey $550k G Jimmy Howard $850k That totals up to $3.9m, and leaves us with a forward and defense spot and $12.277m. Now we have to consider, of course, that the Wings have four of their top eight forwards coming up for free agency after this season. These four forwards have a total cap hit of $4.807 currently. We'll project a few rates for them as well: F Henrik Zetterberg $7.25m F Jiri Hudler $1.2m F Mikael Samuelsson $1.3m F Johan Franzen $2.75m That totals up to $12.5m, which leaves us with $4.584m to fill out our roster this year on the assumption that the cap doesn't go up at all next year. The existing lineup before the final two players are signed looks something like: Datsyuk/Zetterberg/Holmstrom Franzen/Filppula/Samuelsson Cleary/Hudler/??? Maltby/Draper/Kopecky McCarty Lidstrom/Rafalski Kronwall/??? Lebda/Meech Chelios Quincey Osgood Howard The forward will be one of two varieties. Either he will be signed for the third line as stated above, or he will be signed for the second line. As a third liner, he will make less than $1.5m. As a second liner, he will make closer to $3m. But the forward signed will be restricted by the defenseman signed; so we'll jump ahead to that spot. The defenseman the Wings would LIKE to sign is Brad Stuart at ~$2.75m. If that happens, it leaves only approximately $1.8m for the forward slot, and means that we likely sign a third liner. If Stuart can't be signed at that rate, the Wings will try to acquire someone of comparable skill for that kind of money or less. Names I see on the UFA chart that might fall into this group: Dmitri Kalinin John-Michael Liles Jason Smith Michal Rosival Certainly not all, if any, of those guys will go at that kind of rate. but if they could, they would be suitable alternatives to Stuart. Failing that, then Andreas Lilja is the guy and will be signed for not more than $1.5m. This, of course, leaves about $3m for the forward slot, meaning that the Wings could sign a second liner. Given the chemistry displayed by the FFS line, though, it is still highly likely that we would see the third line acquisition to play with Hudler and Cleary, albeit possibly a bit more cash would be spent on acquiring a more talented player. Some names I would like to see explored for that slot? Brad Isbister, Josef Vasicek, Jason King, Matt Cooke. All are UFAs I have wanted to see in a Wings uniform. The first three are low-risk players with potentially high yield. Cooke is the only one with any realistic chance of costing upwards of 1.5m for a third line role. As Cooke brings enough skill to play on the second line if need be, and is a very solid defensive type and faceoff specialist, this would be a worthwhile exception to the $1.5m limit. Ideal solution? Stuart and Vasicek are the names I would like to see. Vasicek is a big, talented player with good all-around skills. Very similar to Johan Franzen. He shouldn't cost more than $1m, but he could potentially yield much greater than that. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
betterREDthandead 58 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 It's bad news because it limits the fan base to only those who can afford to go, which is usually not a casual type of fan. Someone who doesn't watch a great deal of hockey is less inclined to buy a $75+ seat when they can spend 1/3 of that or less at another event and get as much enjoyment out of it. Bad news for the fan maybe, but the point of what I was replying to was that it was bad news for the league, which it is not. From a purely revenue standpoint (and the league is a business, so that's 95% of their thinking) it can never be a bad thing when you can raise prices AND quantity sold. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
egroen 384 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 (edited) Eva, I think your numbers are pretty low for some players, but I would love it if Holland managed it. I would still like to see a hired gun or two this year to take advantage of the $$$ we have this year. And I would rather spend most of that money at the beginning of the season vs. the trade deadline. Sundin Forsberg Naslund Selanne Shanahan Jagr Straka I'm not in favor of all these guys (and most of them will probably not even be options for the Wings), just trying to think of who might sign a one year contract, and make a significant impact. Edited June 27, 2008 by egroen Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Reds4Life 51 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 Cap is higher than I expected..good news. We could get impact player very easily Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
eva unit zero 271 Report post Posted June 27, 2008 Eva, I think your numbers are pretty low for some players, but I would love it if Holland managed it. I would still like to see a hired gun or two this year to take advantage of the $$ we have this year. And I would rather spend most of that money at the beginning of the season vs. the trade deadline. Sundin Forsberg Naslund Selanne Shanahan Jagr Straka I'm not in favor of all these guys (and most of them will probably not even be options for the Wings), just trying to think of who might sign a one year contract, and make a significant impact. The Wings have about 8m available for a one-year deal for a guy like that. I just don't expect it to happen because anyone worth that much will be looking for longer term, and anyone who isn't wouldn't be worth throwing our roster out of whack to accomodate them with the knowledge that they almost certainly won't be returning the next season. Although the Bertuzzi buyout makes things interesting...Cleary/Hudler/Bertuzzi for a third line anybody? If he would sign for less than $1.5m, I'd give it a shot. The worst case scenario is that he's waived and we are where we'd be without trying him. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
