Menu
Download the app

SBJ subscribers – Enhance your experience with the revamped iOS app

Franchises

Senators, Eugene Melnyk Draw Criticism For Team's Low Salary Cap

The '19-20 cap number is technically above the $60.2M league floor, but actual salary expenses are lowergetty images

The Senators are "circumventing 'the spirit'" of the NHL salary cap "using a combination of healthy rostered players, 'dead' cap space from injured players and buyouts to crest over the cap floor," according to Greg Wyshynski of ESPN.com. The Senators currently have a "projected cap number of $65,859,999," which is "snugly above the lower limit" of the '19-20 salary cap, which was set at $60.2M. Without injured RWs Ryan Callahan and Marian Gaborik and LW Clarke MacArthur, the Senators have a "total cap number of $50,534,999." But according to Cap Friendly, the Senators' "actual NHL salary expense" will be $47.5M. Wyshynski wrote once again, the "victims of this farce" are Senators fans. There is a "youth movement afoot," but there is a "world of difference between embracing a rebuild and icing a product" that is nearly $20M cheaper than its inflated cap figure, and only a few dollars above the minimum amount the NHL expects its teams to pay players. But that is the "norm in Owner Eugene Melnyk's world" (ESPN.com, 8/1).

CASH CUTBACK: YAHOO SPORTS' Ryan Lambert wrote Melnyk’s "cash-poor approach to running the organization is in evidence everywhere on this roster." It is "likely that nine players at a minimum will be earning less than a million against the cap before rookie performance bonuses." On the one hand, this "maneuvering is admirable because if you’re gonna bottom out, you might as well bottom all the way out and maximize your opportunity to get as many high-end picks as you can." But on the other, this has to be "troublesome" for Senators and NHL fans. Melnyk "seemingly isn’t doing anything" with the $25M he is "saving by not pushing this team to the cap ceiling." Lambert: "It’s only going back to Melnyk" (SPORTS.YAHOO.com, 7/31). SPORTSNET.ca's Wayne Scanlan noted the Senators "don’t make moves without taking their bottom line into consideration." So much for the salary cap structure "ensuring league parity" (SPORTSNET.ca, 7/31).

SBJ Morning Buzzcast: March 25, 2024

NFL meeting preview; MLB's opening week ad effort and remembering Peter Angelos.

Big Get Jay Wright, March Madness is upon us and ESPN locks up CFP

On this week’s pod, our Big Get is CBS Sports college basketball analyst Jay Wright. The NCAA Championship-winning coach shares his insight with SBJ’s Austin Karp on key hoops issues and why being well dressed is an important part of his success. Also on the show, Poynter Institute senior writer Tom Jones shares who he has up and who is down in sports media. Later, SBJ’s Ben Portnoy talks the latest on ESPN’s CFP extension and who CBS, TNT Sports and ESPN need to make deep runs in the men’s and women's NCAA basketball tournaments.

SBJ I Factor: Nana-Yaw Asamoah

SBJ I Factor features an interview with AMB Sports and Entertainment Chief Commercial Office Nana-Yaw Asamoah. Asamoah, who moved over to AMBSE last year after 14 years at the NFL, talks with SBJ’s Ben Fischer about how his role model parents and older sisters pushed him to shrive, how the power of lifelong learning fuels successful people, and why AMBSE was an opportunity he could not pass up. Asamoah is 2021 SBJ Forty Under 40 honoree. SBJ I Factor is a monthly podcast offering interviews with sports executives who have been recipients of one of the magazine’s awards.

Shareable URL copied to clipboard!

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2019/08/02/Franchises/Senators.aspx

Sorry, something went wrong with the copy but here is the link for you.

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2019/08/02/Franchises/Senators.aspx

CLOSE