My follower has requested I blog about my opinions of Ilya Kovalchuk's recent contract. So I'll begin by saying I was surprised the NHL took a stand for a change. Lately, the NHL has played Devil's advocate (truly no pun intended there) with their procedures and policies, placating the masses, while still trying to keep the product on the ice relevant. That being said, the NHL has always been a player's league. Suspensions for on-ice and off-ice conduct have been notoriously light, or non-existent, contract arbitrations are historically player friendly, and the NHL has been loathe to rein in their more colorful representatives. Kovalchuk's contract was so abhorrently obvious in what it was attempting to do, that to ignore it, the NHL would have set a precedent it couldn't have done anything about.
Let's think about this logically. Players of Kovalchuk's talent level are more common than they used to be. The kids being drafted now are stronger, faster and more ready to play in a professional setting than even those of 5 or 10 years ago. Players of a more advanced age, to be politically correct, are more likely to play less than 10 minutes per game, and act more of a on ice coach than an actual go-to guy. I admit that your Sidney Crosbys and the Staal brothers are more anomalies than the norm, but the talent levels just keep increasing. Not only that, but it's easy to turn and burn these kind of players. (Which is not something I advocate by any stretch.) Get them on the team young, let them build their rep all while winning the team games, and then find the next young stud in the following year's draft if the talent is unwilling to stay. While it's understandable to get a guy of Kovalchuk's talent level on your team in his prime, it was begging the NHL to question the veracity of the deal by issuing it in the form of a 17 year contract. Over 40 year old players are hard to come by in today's hard hitting, fast paced game. Chris Chelios is very possibly a freak of nature by playing at his age. So the Devils' honestly couldn't have been shocked by the NHL's decision. No one involved in this signing believed for one moment that Ilya would be playing through the end of the deal. So honestly, why the ruse? I would have to believe that someone in that room said there might be an issue with the league. I'd also imagine it was because of the more recent contracts which have passed inspection by the powers that be that led them to think they could skate this one by. They let Hossa's deal stand, didn't blink at Luongo's 12 year deal, and Pronger's deal with the Flyer's was close to laughable. None of them though, were quite as ridiculous as this one.
While I wouldn't normally applaud the NHL for much lately, I have to say it was about damn time they put their reading glasses on and actually looked at the contract in front of them. Of course in this case as in so many others, the NHLPA can step in, the lawyers will come into play, and the League can hem and haw but will eventually let something almost as asinine slip through. And Kovalchuk will be smiling as the Brinks truck backs up to his house. Welcome to today's NHL.
Ok...*deeeeeeeeeep breath*, here I go. This is what I wrote on my Facebook page to a friend who is a Devils fan after he complained about the Kovalchuk contract being rejected. Basically, his complaint was there was no precedence and similar contracts had not been rejected, so why is Kovalchuk the guinea pig. My response:
ReplyDelete"There are a handful of contracts that preceded Kovalchuk's that should've never been allowed (ex: Kiprusoff, Luongo, Pronger, Hossa). Kiprusoff's was really the one that opened Pandora's Box and I'm just happy that the NHL had the gumption (not foresight, that would be asking too much of Gary Bettman and the NHL) to step up and start canning these contracts. They would be the end of the NHL...no joke. The GMs who played this game [of front-loading contracts] and actually dished out the $$$ to these players in a way that would circumvent the salary cap were brilliant; I give them all the credit in the world. But frankly, these just needed to stop!"
I tweeted (yes, I'm on Twitter...don't laugh) that the contract was a "brilliant atrocity." It was the most accurate name I could give to this motion by Lou Lamoriello et al. Now as I stated, Lamoriello isn't exactly the first one to come up with such an abomination of a contract, but the GMs who got into this game of front loading contracts to circumvent the salary cap: brilliant. That being said, do you really think this is good for the league?!?!?!?!?! Holy crap!!! Considering that teams all around the NHL have been on life support time and time again over money issues (let's ask the Penguins, the Senators, the Coyotes and oh yes, our own Buffalo Sabres about this), you'd think that GMs/teams would try and put a stop to the overspending. You think the Prudential Center in Newark is gonna be packed every night because Kovalchuk is there?!?!?!?! They couldn't fill that place for playoff games with Kovalchuk there!!!!!! The Devils would be an organization that's one step away from bankruptcy, and then we'd have to watch Gary Bettmen lead his merry men into Jersey so he could save the franchise and we can listen season after season about how "hockey in New Jersey can work." Hence, the atrocity.
One of the things I like about the NHL is it has a reputation for being an honest league; that is to say, you don't see some of the goofiness that you would with the other major sports. They don't do things like trade a star player to one team for a collection of players, only to have that star immediately opt out of their contract to go re-sign with his original team (hello, NBA), or pay thousands to millions of dollars in "luxury taxes" so teams can load up on all the all-star athletes they want (MLB, nice to see you in the conversation!). But these contracts which try to circumvent the salary cap are just as those two examples are: laughable. And for a league that is not on the same playing field financially as the NBA or MLB, they're just looking for a way to create more financial problems. Kuddos to you NHL for stopping this before it gets out of hand!!!
EXXXXXXXXXXHAAAAAAAAAAAALE!!!!!