By John Manasso
Foxsportssouth.com
August 11, 2010
Having witnessed Ilya Kovalchuk's fits of temper in the past, I wonder what his reaction was on Tuesday when he learned that an arbitrator agreed with the NHL and voided his 17-year, $102-million contract.
In truth, the reaction might not have been the same as it was when Kovalchuk initially learned last month that the league would not register the contract. Maybe he knew all along that there was a chance that it would play out this way.
From the looks of things, Kovalchuk could get some kind of deal worked out with the New Jersey Devils. But the NHL -- and general managers and player agents -- has entered a brave new world.
When it comes to a future contract for Kovalchuk, the Devil, as they say, will be in the details. The NHL league office has been relatively opaque in exactly what it objects to in the Kovalchuk deal.
Is it the length? Is 17 years simply two years beyond the pale of others the league has registered (namely Rick DiPietro's 15-year deal)? More likely it's those tricky final six years that pay Kovalchuk only $4 million and that the league sees as circumventing the salary cap.
The problem with lowering the cap hit of a deal by $4 million is that it allows teams that spend the most to hoard players, which is exactly what the cap was designed to eliminate. The cap is supposed to be a great leveler, as, theoretically, stars would be forced to spread out among all 30 teams in seeking the best possible contract because of the finite number of dollars each team is able to spend. New Jersey cannot afford Kovalchuk at $10 million per season, but, maybe, a smaller market team could for one season -- think Nashville with Paul Kariya -- as it makes a one-time strategic foray to try and win big.
NHL commissioner Gary Bettman might've thought it complete idiocy if the Devils gave Kovalchuk a contract that averaged $10 million over 17 years, but he probably would not have voided it (Alexander Ovechkin's contract averages just under $10 million over a term that is only shorter by a few years).
It's that salary cap circumvention that he's most concerned with. So, the question again is: How far does the league want to go?
News has broken that the league is investigating the contracts of Philadelphia's Chris Pronger, Boston's Marc Savard and Vancouver's Roberto Luongo. NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly went as far as to tell Comcast Sports Net of Philadelphia that "Yes, the contract can be de-registered in the event a circumvention is found."
And Pronger's contract would seem to fall precisely within the league office's cross hairs. Pronger's deal pays his $7.6 million in each of 2010-11 and 2011-12 but only $525,000 in the final two seasons of his seven-year deal, according to NHLNumbers.com. Pronger will be 43 when that final season ends. The arbitrator in the Kovalchuk case appeared to put particular weight on the fact that Kovalchuk would be 44 in the final year of his deal. Craig Custance of The Sporting News quoted the text of arbitrator Richard Bloch's ruling when it came to the likelihood of Kovalchuk playing at 44 as "not impossible, but it is, at the least, markedly rare."
So, again, how far does the NHL want to go? If Bloch's ruling were to set a precedent, as it would in the legal world (unless appealed to a higher court, which, in this case, could lead to a whole new can of worms), Pronger's deal would seemingly have to be struck down simply for the sake of consistency.
If I'm Devils general manager Lou Lamoriello and Philadelphia is a heated division rival and a contract for a player I was hoping to be perhaps my best just got struck down, wouldn't I strenuously make the point to the league that it is now obligated also to void Pronger's deal?
Luongo will be 43 when his deal sunsets in 2022 -- though his final two years at least pay him $1 million apiece, which is twice as much as Pronger deal pays him in his final two (again, where is the line for what is a valid contract and what is not?). Savard, 33, could possibly be spared, as he will be just shy of 40 -- a year when a reasonable number of players continue to play a high level -- when his seven-year deal ends in 2017.
But if the league chooses to go down the path of voiding contract extensions to some of its biggest stars -- and all three of the contracts under investigation are extensions that do not go into effect until the coming season -- it could mean full-scale labor war. Right now, the NHLPA is in a place of weakness, as it lacks an executive director, let alone one with a strong hand.
The league already has suffered the worst labor stoppage in the history of North American pro sports only five years ago. Many of these technical aspects -- what is the appropriate length of a contract, what is the appropriate minimum salary at the final years of a deal, etc. -- would seemingly best be settled by collective bargaining whenthe current CBA expires in a few seasons.
If the league uses the Bloch decision to set those parameters on its own, wouldn't it be coming dangerously close to stoking those labor fires again?
