Huge news has exploded across Twitter today after the NHL and NHLPA concluded their meeting.
Per @reporterchris and the rest of Toronto sports media, NHL goes 50/50 in latest offer. Hoped PA would blink; was ready to go here 4 weeks
— Greg Wyshynski (@wyshynski) October 16, 2012
Bettman says NHL made proposal today to preserve 82 game season to start on Nov. 2. He says it includes a 50-50 split across the board.
— Dan Rosen (@drosennhl) October 16, 2012
Bettman says there is no rollback. He said proposal was long term deal. He did not mention years in deal.
— Dan Rosen (@drosennhl) October 16, 2012
More and more players have been going overseas to play in different European leagues, and the NHL wants to be able to salvage the season. Apparently, they have designed a schedule that could fit in all 82 games from November-April.
This deal is the first realistic deal, in terms of revenue split, that the owners have offered the players and with no mention of rolling back salaries, this could be the start to the deal getting done.
Am told in NHL offer there is a proposal designed to "protect" players for salary reductions in the initial years
— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) October 16, 2012
Also league has taken off table some of the systemic changes to player contracts which they asked for in initial July offer
— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) October 16, 2012
One of the major concerns outside of the revenue split has been how much salaries would be rolled back for the players. The players don’t want to give up the contracts that many have signed recently, mainly because the average career length for hockey players is around five years. As the players are already the ones who are paid the least of the major sports, it seems reasonable that they don’t want to sacrifice more of their salaries.
I may be a bit hopeful, but I think that this offer will be the start of a solution, and the fact that this offer came in October instead of November or December, means that the owners aren’t as serious as they were during the last lockout. In this staring contest, it appears that the owners have blinked first.
