Faceoff Factor

Comments

1. Pen1967

   Jun 16, 10:56 AM

   Aren’t contracts signed by players 35 and over treated differently by the CBA? I’m not sure what exact age Sydor was when he signed with the Pens last year, but I believe he was 35. If this is so, maybe it doesn’t pay the Pens to use their last buyout on Sydor who’ll be off their roles next year when Malkin’s new deal will kick in.

2. Matt Bodenschatz

   Jun 16, 11:01 AM

   I’m not sure of the specific rules in Sydor’s case, either. I did a little CBA research before writing this and walked away about as uncertain as I was beforehand. The only exclusivity I found with regards to buyouts is that younger players can be bought out for less. Since I didn’t see any specifics pertaining to players older than 35, I took Richardson’s word on the issue, as he is generally right. But I tend to agree, if it isn’t the typical buyout, Shero would be better off just eating the contract for one more year (assuming he can’t find a trade partner).

   Maybe Michael Farkas can chime in and add his CBA expertise.

3. Michael Farkas

   Jun 16, 01:59 PM

   If Darryl Sydor is bought out he will still count fully against the Upper Limit because he signed a multi-year deal after his 35th birthday. Sydor would count $2.5 million towards our cap for the 08-09 season but would be an unrestricted free agent (see: St. Louis buys out Dallas Drake in June 2007).

4. Matt Bodenschatz

   Jun 16, 02:02 PM

   So, is there any benefit to this other than creating a roster spot for someone else? It would seem that, if they cannot trade him, they’d be better of just keeping him on the roster.

5. Michael Farkas

   Jun 16, 03:16 PM

   Cap wise, there is no benefit to buying out a player other than giving him a chance to play elsewhere and opening up a roster spot for yourself.

   I’ll go one further, even if we waive him and send him to the minors, he would still count fully against the Upper Limit.

   We can lose him and his cap hit by waiving him and then another club claims him off regular waivers, or, of course, a trade.

   To be quite honest, I like Sydor as our 6/7 guy, I don’t see why there is such a hurry to move him. October 12th, Hal Gill gets hurt for a month…now what? Alain Nasreddine is in Germany, Scudsy is already in the lineup…Goligoski can’t really play defense yet…we’re in some trouble.

   If Sydor is willing to stay knowing that he’s a 6/7 guy, it can’t really hurt to keep him around. The big re-signings (Malkin mostly, and then Staal’s not nearly as major contract) won’t take effect until after Sydor’s contract is up anyway.

   He’s a very capable 6/7 guy in the NHL still.

6. Matt Bodenschatz

   Jun 16, 03:30 PM

   Michael, I don’t disagree with your assessment, though I tend to think a serviceable guy equally as effective as Sydor could be had for less than half of his salary. And, considering he’ll most likely be a bench player, paying $2.5 is a lot of money.

   Gonchar, Orpik, Scuderi, Gill, Letang and Whitney currently make up the top six, assuming Orpik re-signs. Eaton is still an option, especially if he takes a pay cut (seeing as how he has done nothing to merit a raise), and there are plenty of other average defenders to fill the depth chart.

   But I suppose if no one wants him, it would be stupid to dump him and eat his entire salary and still have ti count against the cap.

7. Pens1967

   Jun 16, 04:18 PM

   Michael, thanks for the explanation.

   Personally, I’d have no trouble keeping Sydor next year. If we have to pay him, he may as well serve a useful purpose. As Michael said, you never know what could happen.

8. Ben Schmidt

   Jun 16, 04:52 PM

   Michael, I’m not sure you are correct about Sydor counting against the Cap in full if they buy him out.

   Section 50.5(d)(iii) covers the Salary Cap hit for contract buyouts, and nowhere in there does it take age of the player into consideration for the Cap hit.

   Following the rules set forth in that section, my calculations show that buying out Sydor would mean incurring a Cap Hit of approximately $0.833M per year for two years, for a savings of roughly $1.667M for next season.

   I suspect you’re using Section 50.5(d)(i)(A)(5) to make the case that he would count for the full $2.5M. I’m not sure if that applies, though, since the nature of a buy-out is that it is the termination of an SPC (see Exhibit 1 “Standard Player’s Contract” Section 13(d)), thus meaning that the Player (Sydor) would not be a “Player who is in the second or later year of a multi-year SPC”.

   As a side note: I discovered I was mistaken when I previously posted here a while back that there were a maximum of 3 buyouts per team over the life of the CBA. It turns out that only applies to buy-outs done outside the regular buy-out period, which runs from June 15th-June 30th this year. (see Section 11.18 of the CBA).

9. Matt Bodenschatz

   Jun 16, 04:54 PM

   No doubt, if he has to be paid one way or another, it makes no sense to utilize a buyout. But, if he can be dealt for a bag of chips, as Tom said, I think it would be difficult to pass, considering his replacement likely would make half his salary or less, thus freeing up around $1.25 million or more to add to improving the offense.

10. Eric

    Jun 16, 06:13 PM

    I’m pretty sure that the age does affect the determination of the cap room, and I believe Michael is right about the 35+. I think it was at the beginning of last season, or maybe two seasons ago the Devils were in hot water because (I think it was) Alexander Mogilny had retired and still had time left on his contract so the Devils had to work out a deal before they played or else faced a fine. I think they ended up trading a portion of his salary or maybe even his rights to San Jose for Jim Fahey or Rob Davidson.. Or it was all just a dream…

11. Michael Farkas

    Jun 16, 06:32 PM

    Well Ben, I’ll start with your last comment. The 3 buyouts refers to “complaince buyouts” not “ordinary course buyouts” the latter of which are unlimited.

    But you bring up an interesting point that I didn’t really consider. Darryl Sydor is technically in the first year of his contract until June 30th. I wonder if, on technicalities, we could buy him out. But see, that would defeat the clause of “multi-year deal” wouldn’t it? Because it would HAVE to be a three year deal or longer, wouldn’t it? Because we aren’t going to buyout Sydor next offseason, his contract just expires.

    I cite Dallas Drake again, who signed a two-year deal (IIRC) with St. Louis on 7/1/2006 and was subsequently bought out in June of 2007. Which would technically be the first year of his contract; the first of two years.

    So, by that interpretation, I think the NHL means that if a player enters into a multi-year contract after the age of 35 that you are on the hook no matter what, it can’t mean “well, as long as you get rid of him in the first year, you’re okay.”

    Because that would create a loophole, say I wanted to sign Forsberg at age 38 and I give him $5M in the first year, $3M in the second year, $1.5M in the third, $1.25M in the fourth, $1M in the fifth and then proceed to buy him out after just one year. My cap hit isn’t that bad while he’s playing and it’s not that bad when I buy him out.

    If it’s the way you interpret it, I think that’s a loophole. If it’s the way I interpret it, I think Sydor would count fully.

    Interesting points though Ben, I’m going to look into this further and see what I can find.

12. Eric

    Jun 16, 08:08 PM

    BTW, I was wrong about it being Alexander Mogilny. The trade I was referring to was:

    2006-Oct-01 San Jose Sharks traded Jim Fahey with Alexander Korolyuk to New Jersey Devils for Vladimir Malakhov and round 1 pick in the 2007 draft (David Perron).

    But from what I’ve read of the CBA in the past, I’ve also shared the same interpretation as Michael.

13. Ben Schmidt

    Jun 16, 10:42 PM

    Eric – age does factor into the amount of the Cap Hit in that a player under 26 gets only 1/3 of the remaining contract over twice the remainder of the term, while for players 26 and over it is 2/3 of the remaining contract over twice the remainder of the term. Those numbers do factor into how the Cap Hit is calculated.

    Michael – I don’t think it’s a loophole at all. I think the clause you are citing is designed to prevent a team from sending a player down to the minor leagues to avoid having his large contract count against the Cap. Basically, the only way they can avoid having a 35+ player who is in their 2+ year of their contract not count against their Cap is to suspend them or have them on LTIR.

    Additionally, considering the buyout period is only from June 15-June 30, how would it even be possible to buyout a player in the first year of their contract if the end of the first year would count as part of their second year?

    Still, I’m not saying Sydor would count as still being in the first year of his SPC – I’m saying he wouldn’t count as being in an SPC at all, anymore, after being bought out. It is referred to as a termination of the SPC in the CBA and in the SPC itself, after all.

    I’m not aware of what Drake’s contract was when he was bought out. It’s quite possible that it worked out that way due to the way the calculation of the cap hit is done. It’s not straightforward. The Cap Hit for a buyout is based on a formula that takes the original actual salary, the original cap hit, and the buyout salary as inputs. For Sydor, it just happens to work out to the same as if it were just 2/3 * 2.5M spread over two years, but that’s only because his actual salary and his cap hit are the same value. It works out differently otherwise.

    The Forsberg contract you cite actually would be illegal, because the CBA states that there is only so much variance in the value of the annual salaries, and a 5x multiplier from lowest to highest is completely outside the bounds. This is how the Erat contract got rejected by the League. Right now, I don’t have the CBA on hand, so I can’t cite the specific section or the exact variance permitted, but I’ll look those up when I get a chance. Likewise, I’ll post the actual formula used to calculate the cap hit when I’ve got the CBA in front of me as well.

    I cited the sections that have this information in my post above, though, for anyone who is impatient and willing to look it up for themselves :)

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