The National Hockey League has the lowest salary cap in all of the four major sports. Right now the cap is $56.8 million.
The heads of the NHL say this is good since it creates parity in the league by not allowing any team to have all the great players while other teams struggle to bring in anybody.
Basically, there are no teams like the New York Yankees in hockey.
Well, teams have finally found a way to maneuver around the cap and still bring in great talent: They are giving their stars long-term deals.
These deals last about 10 to 13 years, and as the years add on, the salary goes down, so by the time the player is on his last couple of years he's making only about $500,000, and his cap hit is little too nothing.
The league decided to look into these deals after the Chicago Blackhawks signed Marian Hossa to a 12-year deal worth $62.8 million.
Hossa will be 42 by the time the deal is finally over, and it's safe to say Hossa will not be playing when he is 42. The cap hit to the Blackhawks is just $5.275 million a year, which in reality is a steal considering Hossa would normally command a hit of at least $7 mil ...
Read Full Article at Bleacher Report - NHL
Article written by Ryan Pickard
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December 10th, 2009 by Ryan Pickard Leave a reply »
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