You all remember the days under the old CBA when you had payrolls of 50, 60 and 70 million, it was crazy, i’m sure you agree. In 2003-04, the last season under the old CBA, the average in payroll for all 30 teams was 44 million. Last season, year one of the cap era, the average for all the clubs was below 35 million, 34,510,407$ to be exact. These are not official numbers from the NHL, but i’m sure they must be pretty close. These are cap money numbers and not actual salaries as seen on the NHLPA’s site.
The difference this past season to what we saw in the past, the gap between the team that spent the least and those that bumped against and went over the upper limit is not as wide. In 2003-04, the Pittsburgh Penguins spent about 25 million, one of the lowest, while teams like Detroit, Colorado and of course the New York Rangers, spend over 60 million, so you see how wide the gap was. In 2005-06, the lowest spending team in cap money of course, was the Minnesota Wild with 25, 312, 213$ and the highest was the Tampa Bay Lightning with 38,282,943$ and being cap compliant thru out the season if i’m not mistaken. As you can see, the gap is not as wide as before the lock-out. The Carolina Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup with a cap hit of 31,530,422$, so when you can get quality and quantity to match, it can take you a long way. As I said during the playoffs, who ever won the cup, they would become the poster boys on how to build a cup winning team without spending like drunken sailors.
I wonder what is happening with Simon Gagné’s contract situation, we have not heard about it in awhile. I guess Bobby Clarke is waiting to see if Keith Primeau will be back or not. If Primeau does decide to retire , that would free up cap money to sign Gagné, but would Clarke sign him to his asking price of 5m a year, we will have to wait to see.
I think J.P. Dumont may have missed out on a chance to become a member of Les Glorieux (Canadiens) due to the timing of his arbitration hearing, had he been available at the same time as Samsonov, Mr.Gainey may have gone with Dumont and saved some bucks to use at the trade deadline or to compensate to pay a remplacement for Francis Bouillon, who will be on injury reserve until November, unless Gainey can get Bouillon’s salary taken off the books, which i doubt, but who knows.
The other day i came across a blog, the blogger claims to be an NHL insider, with the Montreal Canadiens, he says that he works under Julien Brisebois in the legal department and Knows the true Habs cap situation. In his latest entry, he claims that something is brewing and that we should be hearing things soon. For one, i’m not sure if i do this if i was in his situation, the risk of getting caught is pretty high and losing your job with the most prestigious franchise in NHL history does not look good on a resume. For now, i’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
That’s all for now folks !
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