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CBA PRIMER: UNDERSTANDING THE NEW DEAL
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Canadian Press - 7/14/2005 2:36:18 PM

TORONTO (CP) - Some details expected in the six-year tentative deal announced
Wednesday by the NHL and NHL Players' Association:

- A 24 per cent salary rollback on all existing contracts.

- The upper limit on the salary cap for 2005-06 will be $39 million US while the
minimum floor will be at $21.5 million, based on projected revenues of $1.7
billion.

- Players salaries cannot - on a league-wide basis - take up more than 54 per
cent of revenues; In ensuing years, the cap levels will be decided by the
previous year's revenues. This can cut two ways: if revenues grow in future
years, the cap will move upward in the players' favour, perhaps much higher than
the $42.5-million hard cap offered by the league before the season was
cancelled; but if the NHL gets hammered by the fallout from the lockout, the cap
could be even lower than $39 million for the 2006-07 season.

- A percentage of salaries will be put into escrow until the new salary cap can
be calculated at the end of each season.

- No player can earn more than 20 per cent of the team cap, which for 2005-06
means no player can earn more than $7.8 million.

- As of 2007-08, players - regardless of age - can become unrestricted free
agents after seven years in the NHL, with the 2004-05 wiped-out season counting
in the service time. That means any player who began his career in the NHL at
the age of 18 can qualify for unrestricted free agency at 25. In the meantime,
the age of unrestricted free agency will remain 31 this summer but will
gradually be brought down to 27 by the end of 2007-2008 season.

- Revenue-sharing where the top 10 money-making clubs donate to a fund shared by
the bottom 15 teams.

- The entry-level system will limit those players to $850,000 a year in salary
(which it was 10 years ago) with bonuses not as easily reachable as the previous
deal. The maximum possible amount in bonuses is $4.5 million although it's
unrealistic for almost anyone to reach all the lofty targets. The age
for draft eligibility will also be raised from 18 years to 19 years.

- Two-way salary arbitration. Both players and owners can select to go to
arbitration, whereas only players had those rights in the previous deal. This
will allow owners to downgrade underperforming players.

- The ability for teams to buy players out of their contracts at two thirds of
their value at no cost towards the salary cap within 10 days after the CBA
officially takes effect. This is meant to help teams fit under the cap but the
clubs won't be able to re-sign those players.

- Teams will not be allowed to re-structure existing player contracts in an
attempt to fit a big salary under the cap.

- League-wide minimum salary bumped up to $450,000 from $185,000. The minimum
goes up to $500,000 in the sixth year of the deal.

- The league will play an unbalanced schedule.  Teams will play their
four divisional opponents a total of eight times for 32 games. Teams will play
their 10 conference rivals a total of 4 times for 40 games.  Teams will
play a home-and-home against each team in one division of the other conference
for a total of 10 games - that's a total of 82 games.

- Participation in the February 2006 Olympics in Turin, Italy.

 

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