I am looking for opinions of NHL experts?

Contrary to what you might hear on these pages. This lockout is not about the players being exploited or greedy owners wanting more. It is about dumbing down the CBA. Let's look at the issues one by one.

a) 50-50 split. This makes sense and both sides seem to agree. Or do they? The NHLPA's last 50-50 was in actual fact 56.5 - 43.5. Not much of a move after all. The 50 - 50 would only be achieved when revenue growth grew to a point that players salaries (which would grow at 3.5% per annum) would shrink to 50% as total dollars grew. Fehr's 50-50 was hypothetical only.

b) Five year term on contract with no back sliding. This is no brainer but why is it necessary? Under the present CBA there is no limit. That is why the Kovalchuk, Parise, Suter, and Weber contracts came into being. The league couldn't make these changes outside of the CBA.

c) Ten year term on CBA. This is the owners attempt to keep away from future lockouts and strikes. The last CBA was five years. The PA extended it twice and wanted to extend it again. Why would they not want labour peace again?

d) Make whole is the owners attempt to live with their stupidity during the last contract. It is a process to move fairly easily into 50-50 with minimal pain.

e) Other issues seem to have been resolved, but most are simple and easily resolved.

It is a fallacy to think that the players want to just play the game. The players want to make as much money as possible while playing this game. In spite of their protestations that it is about the future of the game it is all about what is in it for me?

The NHL said the contract limit is a "hill we will die on". The NHLPA has rejected that offer coldly as being unfair to the players. Let's look at that There are 22 players with deals longer than seven years. That is 3% of the players. So are we fighting fo 3% only? well maybe it's for those between 5 and 7 years who signed as free agents. How many are there of these? My count is 13. So the total of affected players under this clause is 35 players or less than 5%. Even if there were 50 that would only be 7%, and strangely enough these players all have large signing bonuses which aren't affected by lockouts. So are the players tilting at the wrong windmills?

The 2004-05 lockout was over issues that the owners then said that they needed in order to have 'cost certainty'. They got their desired goals, and the CBA that was a result reflected the things that the owners wanted.

Now, a mere eight years later, how is it possible that the owners have suddenly become so stupid that their existing cost certainty is not good enough for them ?

As has been pointed out, Bullsh*t Bettman put many teams in places where they can't make money. There's a reason that five of the six most profitable teams in the league are in Canada, and the NYRangers are the lone US team on that list. Because those teams are all in markets where a local NHL game won't just sell out the building, but will also mean that 500,000 or more fans will watch the game on TV. Go to places such as Phoenix, and while you might be able to find 18,000 paying fans to go to a game, you won't find more than another 10,000 who will watch the game on TV. For advertisers, 10K viewers isn't worth the ad money that 500K+ viewers are worth. That's where the southern US teams are failing.

Asking the players to make sacrifices due to bad league and team owner policies isn't reasonable. And, between 2005 and 2012, NHL revenues went up from $2.0 billion to $3.3 billion. Just staying at the same revenue sharing percentages between players and owners means that BOTH sides make more money.

So, this time, the owners and Bettman are the sole douchebags.

I agree with NHL expert Nicholas Goss. He wrote a very good article on why revenue sharing is essential in the next CBA between the NHL and the NHLPA. 7 out of the 9 teams in the Western and Southern markets are losing money. The NHL owners decided to put franchises there, not the players. Either those teams should get more revenue sharing money or the franchise have to move. The players should not be expected to sacrifice for these non-traditional hockey market teams.

when the players were negociating with the owners the offer that was made then by the owners was fair and should of been signed by the players.

Unfortunately the 10% of the elite on the players side decided to go fishing and they caught air. now the other 90% of the players are in trouble.

The owners can be in lockout for years if they want for all of the the hockey teams are toys and if they loose some money they will survive with the main companies. the players only have a few years to make their money after that it's game over.

poor players they should sign and sign fast.

Rangers-Caps - Caps, take the over. Lundquist has been sturdy, however the Caps desire it, Theodore hasn't been sturdy and that i doubt he gets any greater advantageous. Rangers 3 - Caps - 5 Flames-Blackhawks - Flames come back heading in the right direction in a ought to win, Kipper will arise extensive. Flames 2 - Blackhawks - 0 - take the under. Montreal-Boston - Montreal is respectable at residing house, yet they are purely not very nearly as sturdy as Boston. Boston wins 3-2 - under. or lay off that, imo.