Save me the nostalgia for a theme song that is probably not one of the big money people at ESPN, who has spent years on the air without mentioning the NHL, even if LeBron James and Tom Brady would hum it.
Do not preach to me about how much the NHL will benefit from being exposed to the fact that its games are broadcast on one of Disney’s platforms, streaming or otherwise. This is what I have always wanted to know: what would an adult outside of Bristol, Conn., Ever possess to refer to a television network as ‘motherhood’ or ‘the world leader’?
There’s one and only thing of interest attached to the NHL’s media rights deal with Disney, ESPN and their affiliated brands that include the Hulu streaming service, and that’s the money.
This is the Rod Tidwell moment of Slap Shots: Show me the money and tell me how quickly its introduction into league revenue could wipe out the NHL players’ guarantor debt that threatens to strangle the league beyond the expiration of the current collective bargaining agreement.
That’s all that counts.
According to the agreement reached last summer, the salary limit cannot increase by more than $ 1 million per season before the surety debt is paid off. In addition, if a certain amount of surety debt remains on the ledger in 2024-25, the parties will have to devise a formula according to which the PA will repay the league in full after the expiration of the CBA in 2025-26. Wouldn’t that be nice? Children who are currently 13 years old and play Bantam hockey pay for this.
The deal with ESPN is thought to be worth about $ 420 million a year. A secondary package yet to be negotiated or completed with a second media rights partner is expected to cost around $ 200 million per year. This is obviously a significant increase over the $ 200 million total the NHL receives under the current agreement with the NBC networks, but it’s probably not the grand slam home series – OK, a natural hat trick – the league would possibly suggested it before the pandemic struck. .
The surety debt at the end of this season is likely to be around $ 900 million. If the players return only half of the incoming TV money, it’s about $ 310 million per? It will therefore take three years of media rights cash to offset the current debt.
Except that the debt will virtually grow as a result of the annual overrun of the payroll. It is still not told what protocols of the next season may entail and whether full houses will be allowed in the league. But even as league revenue fell back to the $ 5 billion mark predicted for a completed 2019-20 year, the withholding of the deposit was at 14 percent.
After the next season, the deposit will be limited between 16 and 18 percent, and it will be at 10 percent in 2022-23 and the next three years of the agreement at six percent. So unless the NHL generates additional revenue initiatives, there will be waste every season, and where and when it will stop, no one knows.
Maybe the NHL will thrive with exposure to ESPN, maybe the network will post other properties on its Plus streaming website and hockey will benefit from it. But this deal was all about the money. The NHL will only owe ESPN if the deal can cover the PA debt.
Not so much this season, when everything went wrong in Buffalo, but even when Taylor Hall had his Hart Trophy season in New Jersey 14 years ago (what is it? It was only three years ago?), There was everyone left the league talks about how the wing was an ‘I’ in an ‘us’ sport.
Would the islanders, the Ultimate We Team led by the Ultimate We Guys, Lou Lamoriello and Barry Trotz, dare to put Hall in the mix as a rental price on the deadline if the injury to Anders Lee is as serious as what it may occur?
Here’s the rule about Lamoriello: there are no rules.
If you think you know what he’s going to do, you do not know.
In fact, ESPN does have a group of professionals who will definitely treat hockey with loving care, although it is inevitable that the network will do its best to stun the sport, as it is regularly done with most other properties. .
If there’s a petition that needs signatures to get Gary Thorne on next season’s roster of play-by-play people, you can just add this moment electronically.
Screenshot, almost halfway home. Elite Eight: 1. Islanders; 2. Tampa Bay; 3. Toronto; 4. Carolina; 5. Vegas; 6. Washington; 7. Florida; 8. Pittsburgh.
Mid-season, biggest disappointments: 1. Dallas; 2. Colorado; 3. Columbus; 4. Nashville.
Mid-season, biggest surprises: 1. Chicago; 2. Winnipeg; 3. Los Angeles; 4. Florida.
Who wants to bet that the seven-match suspension against Tom Wilson was charged for his cheap shot that hit Brandon Carlo, with the permission of Sixth Avenue as excited as the rest of us by the Department of Player Safety’s penchant for the fine print fine comb to allow recidivist headhunters to become shot free?
Do you realize that seven of the NHL’s top 13 goal scorers were born in the USA during Friday’s matches, with three from Canada?
Who scored 36-year-old Dustin Brown for seventh place in the league with goals, with 13 to Friday?
Better question: Who, even a few seasons ago, still had Brown on the Kings at the age of 36?
In the league, maybe?
Is there more separation between 2015’s first and second overalls, Connor McDavid and Jack Eichel, or between 2016’s Auston Matthews and Patrik Laine?
Finally, this Quick Quiz: Is Laine the New Age Marian Gaborik?
Answers will be graded by visiting professor John Tortorella, who most likely will not get the term of office after the semester.