NHL Rumor Mill – November 13, 2024
Are more moves coming for the Penguins? What changes could be coming in the next CBA? Find out in today’s NHL Rumor Mill.
WHAT NEXT FOR THE PENGUINS?
TSN: Darren Dreger reports the Pittsburgh Penguins aren’t engaging in a fire sale despite recent speculation.
Dreger claims Penguins general manager Kyle Dubas recently reached out to other GMs around the league to let them know he’s open for business and to call him if they have any ideas. However, that’s standard practice for NHL general managers, especially those with struggling teams but there’s no sense of panic.
DK PITTSBURGH SPORTS: Taylor Haase reported a league source told her Dubas had let it be known that “everyone is available, except 87 (Sidney Crosby)”. However, he doesn’t intend to tear down the roster and start a full rebuild. Haase believes that won’t happen until Crosby retires.
Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Kris Letang (NHL Images).
Any future moves by Dubas will be to get back players instead of draft picks and prospects. He remains committed to trying to win with at least Crosby.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: These reports came out before the Penguins traded Lars Eller to the Washington Capitals yesterday evening.
THE SCORE: Josh Wegman pointed out that selling off pending unrestricted free agents (like Eller) is common practice for teams near the bottom of the standings like the Penguins. Potential rental chips include Anthony Beauvillier, Drew O’Connor, Marcus Pettersson and Matt Grzelcyk.
THE HOCKEY NEWS: Kelsey Surmacz added Jesse Puljujaarvi to that list of pending UFAs. She also suggested players signed beyond this season like Noel Acciari, Alex Nedeljkovic, and perhaps Kris Letang.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: Those pending UFAs likely won’t fetch much as far as players go. As for Letang, he has a full no-movement clause until the end of 2025-26, which he’ll have a 10-team no-trade list. He could waive it to go elsewhere but there’s no certainty he will.
Everyone may be available but some could be difficult to move because of their no-movement clauses (Evgeni Malkin) or a combination of expensive contracts and slumping performance (Erik Karlsson).
WHAT CHANGES COULD WE SEE IN THE NEXT NHL CBA?
THE ATHLETIC: Pierre LeBrun reported on feedback from the NHL general managers to tweak the CBA in the next round of collective bargaining with the players, slated to start next year.
Reducing term limits on player contracts was the one that most interested LeBrun. According to NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly, it wasn’t anything more specific than the GMs saying if they could achieve bargaining shorter contract limits, it should be on the list.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: LeBrun reminds us that contract term limits were a contentious issue during the 2012 negotiation. Both sides agreed on eight years for a player re-signing with his team and seven years for those signing elsewhere as unrestricted free agents.
Other issues raised by the general managers include revising the restricted free agent compensation chart for offer sheets, potentially moving to a high/low model for salary arbitration, updating the walkaway thresholds for arbitration awards, and expanding buyout rights.
LeBrun indicated the preliminary sense is neither side wants another difficult CBA battle, preferring to make tweaks rather than major changes. Nevertheless, he cautions that things could change once both sides are in the same room.
SPECTOR’S NOTE: The NHL has come out of the uncertainty of the COVID seasons with growing revenue due to factors like expansion, the rise of sports gambling and recent national broadcasting deals in the United States.
Neither side wants to do anything that will jeopardize that growth. Talks could go sideways if one side digs in its heels, but I believe they’ll reach an agreement the current CBA expires in September 2026 without too much difficulty.
Allow teams to buy out any players contract a full value without penalty to the cap if they so choose along with the prorated version currently used with % of cap Will give players full pay if released and also leave cap for teams to spend more$$
Maybe one “full value” buy-out allowed every 2 years.
As far as 8-yr contracts go, maybe only 2-3 per team to designated “franchise” players. 7yrs max to re-signing players otherwise and 6 yr max to free agents.
I think you have that one wrong. First why should a player way underperforming his contract be paid the full amount? Reason for the buyout in most cases.What might be a a good meet in the middle would be reduce the buyout formula slightly for the owners but dont use the buyout amount against the cap creating a bunch of dead cap space. Then that cap space can be utilized & spent back into the players salary pool. Win win me thinks.
I think teams overpaying players deserves a penalty. Personally, I like the current system. Only thing that needs changing is the no cap in the playoffs.
I’m with Owen on this one. The whole point of the cap was to keep a competitive balance between the large market teams and the smaller market teams, as they were losing money, or walking from their best players, or leaving markets entirely. Jets left WPG when there wasn’t a cap, came back when there was.
Allowing the large market teams to spend big $ on any UFA’s they want and simply buy them out when it doesn’t work out is a significant advantage that small market teams simply can’t compete with.
No way. All this does is reward rich teams. The punishment for bad contracts has to exist or those rich teams buy their cups and newer teams stand little chance.
It’s my opinion that the NHL has problems. Even the plumber in my town is making more money than ever, that’s nothing special. The fact they had to expand, profit off of gambling and add jersey advertisements is proof enough. Nobody is watching.
There is too much of an emphasis on skill these days. Not enough on the physicality. IMO that is what made hockey the best sport, the competition between skill and physicality. They are tilting way too far on the skill side (in an effort to win over those who don’t like hockey in the first place, ironically enough). The cap is also bad. It does not make all teams equally great, it makes them all equally bad.
I totally disagree. I think the cap is what it is. You look at pro soccer in Europe and it’s the pretty much the same mega rich clubs winning. The cap creates more equality.
As far as skill vs grit, I think they’ve done a great job. Hated seeing skilled players ankle break defenders only to get hooked back to nullify a great scoring chance. Also like that a lot of the head shot stuff is leaving the game. These guys deserve to live a healthy life after leaving the game.