from Jesse Spector of The Sporting News,
Get back on the ice, start collecting ticket revenue again, start selling merchandise again, and put the game front and center instead of posturing, browbeating, and greed. It’s not only the best way to set about repairing the NHL’s image, which believe it or not still has not hit rock bottom, it is the best way to make a deal.
Every observer agrees that the best chance to make progress on a collective bargaining agreement is to take negotiations out of the public eye. What better way to do that than to bring back hockey and move the CBA backstage?
The obvious question about how to start a new season is how to make the financial system work, but the NHL already has a mechanism to handle this: the escrow system of the last CBA. It’s pretty simple, really. Pay all players according to their current contracts, which already are tied to the NHLPA’s share of hockey-related revenue, and put everything into escrow above the 50 percent threshold of HRR that is the NHL’s baseline in negotiations. Once a new deal is negotiated, pay the players what they are owed, including “make-whole” shares, out of that escrow pool.
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