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A bit of joyful reminiscing by Lidstrom can be a soothing balm for the burn of the rebuild (above)
Expansion Draft talk Of the moves Yzerman made, it was interesting to see the short term contracts and Athanasiou traded to Edmonton. Perhaps the best part of this painful season is the lack of concern on who to protect when Seattle comes calling. From the article:
“At forward, the Red Wings are certain to protect Dylan Larkin, Anthony Mantha, Tyler Bertuzzi, Filip Zadina and Robby Fabbri. The other two slots could be used for Evgeny Svechnikov and Givani Smith. If they re-sign Luke Glendening, he could be protected or exposed. Or they might acquire someone in a trade or through free agency they would opt to protect.
The only other forwards under contract for 2021-22 are Justin Abdelkader and Frans Nielsen, who surely won’t be protected and are also buyout candidates in 2021. If Christoffer Ehn, Adam Erne and/or Dmytro Timashov are signed through 2021-22, they are likely to be exposed.
Center prospect Joe Veleno is exempt.
On defense, they would protect Filip Hronek, Dennis Cholowski and either Danny DeKeyser or someone acquired through trade or free agency. Moritz Seider and Gustav Lindstrom are exempt.
The Red Wings might need to acquire a defenseman or re-sign one through 2021-22 (like Patrik Nemeth, Alex Biega or Madison Bowey) to fulfill the requirement of exposing an NHL-experienced D-man.”
Of course, immediately you will notice that lack of Rasmussen’s name (as he’s not currently under contract). I feel strongly that either Ras or Svech will no longer be part of the team by the time the draft comes calling. Also, for those who aren’t completely sold on Fabbri, the suggestion to expose him will come at some point. The possible wild card is Givani Smith. A lot will depend on this season. He’s got the potential to be a complementary piece, but if Detroit acquires another forward that needs protection, making the position of a depth player a bit more uncertain.
For Defense, there is some comfort in Lindstrom and Seider being exempt. By the end of next year, we should have a better handle on whether or not Cholowski is on the path to become a full time Wing or not. The toss up (if Detroit acquires another defenseman that needs protection) will be between he and Dekeyser. Another injury plagued season could send the once highly touted Dman out off town.
NHL wants some regular season games And, finally, the pain may not be over. There is a significant appetite from both players and the league to see at least some non playoff games to prepare teams for the post season. There are suggestions that these could be just exhibition (pre season type) games, but teams on the bubble are hoping for another crack at the post season.
The pain for Detroit is playing a handful of games that won’t move the needle one way or the other. For fans, it’s a win because, well, hockey. For the NHLPA it would be a win due to that nasty little bug known as escrow. It turns out that the NHL suffers from similar economics as retail stores. The jump from being in the red financially to being in the black or profitable comes at the end of the year. (Black Friday, for those who don’t know, marked the shift to profitability for retail. Stores had all of 5-6 weeks to make their entire year’s profit)
If the season is truly over, players could be facing an escrow level of a whopping 35%. Players have even suggested foregoing a final check to help offset this. Otherwise, with an average of %15 holding, there would be a 20% tariff on the players instead of any kind of refund. Soon after this was learned, player bonuses were discussed as they are typically due in July. Austin Matthews is due a healthy 15 million dollar check, and there’s the rub. Signing bonuses are exempt from escrow. No one talks about it (in fact they avoid it like the plague). Matthews “salary” is around 900K. Meaning, he would pay about 135K at 15% escrow. As opposed to nearly 1.5 million if his AAV were subjected to escrow. First, good for him. His agent and team got him a huge chunk in his pocket. But, it’s gotten the attention of veterans and depth players. Essentially, the highest paid players in the league pay less escrow than the lowest paid veterans. In fact, Toronto pays out 60 million in bonuses, meaning the team with $40 million committed to 4 forwards pays out less escrow than any team in the league.
This “loophole” has been developed to try and force a change in the current system. The 50/50 split means that owners will always recover costs. It falls on the players to make up the gap. And so the generation that figured out they could holdout without arbitration has put the entire system upside down. It has come up at the NHLPA and there are some unhappy folks. Mainly those who took “team deals” until that sweet voyage to UFA status (if you’re lucky enough to last that long, average career around 3 seasons) are now facing the shrugged shoulders of GMs who are out of cap space.
It needs to be fixed at some point. Players have to toe the line of wanting other players to get everything they can. The take home of an NHL pro faces up to 50% in taxes, 15% in escrow, and 10 - 15% in agent fees. It can be around 25%. The take home on a signing bonus has a huge advantage in no escrow (15% back), lower agent fees (as low as 5%), and in some places a cap of 30% taxes. Up to 65% take home as opposed to 20 - 30%. So, the take home on a 10 million dollar bonus can be 6.5 million. The take home on a 10 million dollar salary would be around 3 million. To be fair, most AAVs at that level are signing bonus heavy. But, it means that a player making $2 million is paying double the escrow of someone making 10 million.
All that math is to say that the players who are going to hurt the most with a shortened season are the guys making 3 million and lower. A high enough escrow could put them at an insanely low take home. The player assistance fund will likely help with that, but I’m sure they are aware of how much less escrow they’d be paying if the top 5 or 10 paid players in the league paid more of their AAV%. Have fun at those meetings guys.
Well, what do you think? A lot of people are hurting due to inability to work. Is the situation of low earning NHLers, AHLers, and ECHLers going to be so bad it forces a change in the system? Or will it just see those players consider more strongly an option of playing overseas? Something will have to happen to take care of those who didn’t break through. Hopefully the PA and Ownership will step up and help.
Detroit Red Wings Blogger • 
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