NHL free agency begins Friday and with the rise of the salary cap to $64.3M, every team “seems to have money to spend, and some lower-budget teams will be forced to sign free agents just to get" to the $48.3M salary cap floor, according to Kevin Allen of USA TODAY. Panthers GM Dale Tallon “still needs to spend another $22 million” to reach the cap floor, even after “acquiring big-ticket defenseman Brian Campbell and signing” RW Tomas Kopecky to a four-year, $12M deal. Player agent Steve Bartlett said, “We may see a new position, the ‘cap filler,’ with teams looking at solid older NHL players who might be willing to take a modest salary. Then teams could bonus them for performance that would fill cap space, yet reward those players who prove they can still contribute” (USA TODAY, 7/1).The GLOBE & MAIL's David Shoalts notes this “appears to be the first year in which most news stories this fall concern teams’ attempts to climb to the floor rather than who is getting waived or traded so a team can get its payroll under the cap.” Shoalts adds the Sabres “joined the ranks of the big spenders" thanks to new Owner Terry Pegula (GLOBE & MAIL, 7/1).
EXERCISE CAUTION: Bruins GM Peter Chiarelli Thursday said, “I’m a little cautious going into this market. There’s not the usual supply there normally is. The demand is greater because of the cap floor and because teams have to spend. … The cap is high and the cap is certainly going to come down in some shape or form." He added, "I’m wary of the market, where I think it might be going” (ESPNBOSTON.com, 6/30). YAHOO SPORTS' Nicholas Cotsonika wrote many teams “are struggling to reach a floor that is more than $9 million above the original cap.” Hurricanes GM Jim Rutherford said, “It makes it harder for us to run a successful business. And then not only harder … I mean, even if we spend to the floor, we’re still $16 million behind the other teams, which gives us a disadvantage there” (SPORTS.YAHOO.com, 6/30). Senators GM Bryan Murray said that the “picture is starting to look a bit like the pre-lockout days, when there was a wide gap" between the highest- and lowest-spending teams. Murray: “It’s not as extreme, but it’s pushing that. We certainly didn’t want the cap to get this high, but that’s a fact of life now. We can’t go (to the cap), that’s the first thing. We can’t go to $64 million and we’re not even going to be close to that. For 20 of the 30 teams, I would think, it’s getting real high, but that’s a personal decision” (OTTAWA CITIZEN, 6/30).
ROUGH ROAD AHEAD? The GLOBE & MAIL's Shoalts wrote the salary cap, “accompanied by revenue sharing, was supposed to solve the big market-small market woes.” But it has become a "bloodbath for the little guys, despite revenue sharing and any number of subsidies from local governments.” As a result, sources said that a lockout “is possible” when the CBA expires in September '12 because NHLPA Exec Dir Donald Fehr is “not likely to preside over a huge decrease in the players’ share of the revenue.” Shoalts did note a “more important negotiation may lie ahead,” in the form of a “discussion between the big-market teams and the small-market teams about a more equitable way to cut up the revenue pie” (GLOBE & MAIL, 6/29).
