Wherein I debate labor politics with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mighty_man
2005-07-21 10:17![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
digitaldiscipline
digitaldisciplineMighty Man wrote:
[The labor deal, in the wake of NHL lockout] Sucks for who, I guess is the real question.
One, the fans, who got hosed out of a season's worth of entertainment by rich bastards fucking over other (slightly-less-rich) bastards.
Two, the players, who had nothing to do with ownership's inability to control their spending habits. Someone offers to double your salary, why would you say no? They lost a year of their careers, in addition to getting bent over and rammed up the ass by the new CBA.
The fact that ownership (management) has, essentially, punished the players (workers) for their own shortcomings (gross financial mismanagement) doesn't sit well with me.
The players tried to hardball and failed. Now they have to take what they were given and like it. The owners at least recognized that some of them fucked up and they were taking steps to fix it.
. . . at the expense of the players' salaries. You think for a minute that some billionaire got that way by being so incompetent that he'd consistently lose money on a business, as they claimed to be doing for years before this happend? Bullshit. They turned the tables on the players' union, all the while pocketing the extra monies they weren't reporting as team income ("Hey, I own the Sabres and Adelphia Cable. . . The ad revenue Adelphia earns during Sabres broadcasts is $20mil, but the Sabres' accounting department only shows $2mil in TV ad revenue. . . oh noes, the team is losing money!")
Ownership fucked the players. The fact that in the run-up to the lockout, NHL player's salaries were by far the highest percentage of team expenses of any of the major sports (75%, versus stuff in the mid 60's for MLB, NBA, and NFL) was absolutely the owners' fault, because they're the ones who were overpaying the players. If Joe Sakic said, "I want 10mil a year," and nobody said, "Okay," he'd have been paid what someone had been willing to offer that was less than that. But ownership was always overpaying for the big names, and when they finally realized it, they punitively locked out the players and fucked over the entire league.
They're going to level the playing field, but I have always hated how quickly the roster always turned over in capped sports.
The level playing field is the one bright spot to this. It keeps teams from buying their way to the cup, and it also keeps them from perennially fielding teams that suck (see also: the Montreal Expos, Milwaukee Brewers, and Los Angles Clippers) just so the owner can live off the teat of shared league revenue.
Frankly, I'm more interested in seeing the gameplay and rule changes, all of which could have been brought about without the lockout, and were/are sorely needed to rekindle interest in the league anyways.
[The labor deal, in the wake of NHL lockout] Sucks for who, I guess is the real question.
One, the fans, who got hosed out of a season's worth of entertainment by rich bastards fucking over other (slightly-less-rich) bastards.
Two, the players, who had nothing to do with ownership's inability to control their spending habits. Someone offers to double your salary, why would you say no? They lost a year of their careers, in addition to getting bent over and rammed up the ass by the new CBA.
The fact that ownership (management) has, essentially, punished the players (workers) for their own shortcomings (gross financial mismanagement) doesn't sit well with me.
The players tried to hardball and failed. Now they have to take what they were given and like it. The owners at least recognized that some of them fucked up and they were taking steps to fix it.
. . . at the expense of the players' salaries. You think for a minute that some billionaire got that way by being so incompetent that he'd consistently lose money on a business, as they claimed to be doing for years before this happend? Bullshit. They turned the tables on the players' union, all the while pocketing the extra monies they weren't reporting as team income ("Hey, I own the Sabres and Adelphia Cable. . . The ad revenue Adelphia earns during Sabres broadcasts is $20mil, but the Sabres' accounting department only shows $2mil in TV ad revenue. . . oh noes, the team is losing money!")
Ownership fucked the players. The fact that in the run-up to the lockout, NHL player's salaries were by far the highest percentage of team expenses of any of the major sports (75%, versus stuff in the mid 60's for MLB, NBA, and NFL) was absolutely the owners' fault, because they're the ones who were overpaying the players. If Joe Sakic said, "I want 10mil a year," and nobody said, "Okay," he'd have been paid what someone had been willing to offer that was less than that. But ownership was always overpaying for the big names, and when they finally realized it, they punitively locked out the players and fucked over the entire league.
They're going to level the playing field, but I have always hated how quickly the roster always turned over in capped sports.
The level playing field is the one bright spot to this. It keeps teams from buying their way to the cup, and it also keeps them from perennially fielding teams that suck (see also: the Montreal Expos, Milwaukee Brewers, and Los Angles Clippers) just so the owner can live off the teat of shared league revenue.
Frankly, I'm more interested in seeing the gameplay and rule changes, all of which could have been brought about without the lockout, and were/are sorely needed to rekindle interest in the league anyways.
