‘Threshold’ issue still the stumbling block

TAMPA, Fla. — Hours before a Stanley Cup Finals series that he hopes will signal a stylistic renaissance for his sport — and fresh from an afternoon negotiating session with union head Bob Goodenow — NHL commissioner Gary Bettman reluctantly spent nearly all of his 45-minute state of the game press conference discussing the league’s impending doom.

Of course, there was nothing half-hearted about the way Bettman once again argued the position of NHL owners before Game 1 between Calgary and Tampa Bay.

Bettman vigorously defended the owners’ long-held position that the current collective bargaining agreement, which expires Sept. 15, must be replaced by a dramatically different one that slashes and limits the percentage of the NHL’s $2 billion in gross revenue that goes toward player salaries (currently 75 percent, according to the league).

And when asked if he believed the NHL Players Association was banking on the belief that owners would eventually capitulate rather than have a labor stoppage that wipes out an entire season for the first time, Bettman warned: “I hope that’s not the case. I don’t doubt the players’ resolve – as it’s oft-stated to me by the union and some of the players I talk to. But nobody should doubt the owners’ resolve, if for no other reason than if you look at our economics, you understand that they have no choice.

“If this is a test to see if the owners really mean it, it’s a shame to have to go through all of the hardship that would entail just to prove the point.”

The commissioner contradicted player claims that owners have insisted that a hard salary cap is the only way to achieve their desired revenue redistribution. But he did acknowledge the proposal owners have presented to the NHLPA calls for a split of the NHL pie that would produce an average team payroll of $31 million.

“What we showed them was a framework,” Bettman said. “It said that if you take our $2 billion in revenue and build in a reasonable profit and take out benefits currently given to players that could be part of a new agreement, the average team payroll would be $31 million based on our economics.”

Bettman said he and NHL VP/chief legal counsel Bill Daly met for about 3 hours Tuesday in Tampa with Goodenow and Ted Saskin, NHLPA senior director of business affairs and licensing.

While categorizing their discussion as “candid and cordial, as usual,” Bettman could not report anything resembling progress.

Bettman said the “threshold” issue – determining whether the players’ share should be capped, and at what percentage of league revenues – dwarfs all others. He said he believed once the players signed onto a partnership framework with owners based upon an agreement on that threshold issue, the rest of the CBA could be hammered out “in a matter of days, if not hours.”

Bettman also said there is no problem with either side failing to understand the other’s position. But he acknowledged the owners and players remain fundamentally at odds over the threshold issue.

Bettman, meanwhile, applauded the success of the two small-market teams in the Cup finals.