C-Webb is in the house!

Allen Iverson went to 76ers GM Billy King a few weeks ago and basically said that he needed some help if the team was going to win while he was still in his prime. He also hinted that if the Sixers were unwilling or unable to get him that help that he'd rather get moved to a team that could.

Well Allen, the cavalry is on the way.

Late yesterday Billy King pulled the trigger on a trade that will bring 5 time All-Star power forward Chris Webber from Sacramento, along with two roster filler forwards, for Brian Skinner, Kenny Thomas, and Corliss Williamson.

Basically, the Kings wanted quantity over quality as Peja Stojakovic has not been happy with Webber for a while. Peja wants the Kings' offense to run through him and that wasn't happening with Webber in their lineup.

And my favorite quote so far has to be the one that came from AI when Billy King first talked to him about the possible deal, "You're kidding."

Maybe this will turn out to be a deal that is too good to be true.

Maybe C-Webb's knee is a lot bigger problem than his 21 pts, 10 boards, and 5.5 assists per game this season would suggest.

But, the 6ers are making an effort to improve the team around Iverson. And they made this move without giving up on one of the young players that AI has been excited about the 6ers adding of late including guys like 3-point sharpshooter Kyle Korver and do-it-all rookie Andre Iguodala.

And perhaps even more importantly, King was also able to keep perhaps his most valuable trade asset in Glenn Robinson's $12 million expiring contract. King has said that he'll work right up until the deadline trying to make a deal to improve the club. And everyone knows that Robinson's contract will be the main piece if King can pull off another deal.

But the bottom line is that this is a deal that has almost no downside for the Sixers. Even if Webber's knee becomes problematic down the road, it's not like the Sixers cap will be all that much worse off with Webber's deal on the books and it's not like the Sixers gave up a future All-Star or a 1st round pick in the deal, either.

And while the upside to this deal is huge, just the fact that AI is a lot happier this morning than he was a few weeks ago was worth making the deal happen.

Gretzky won't come out and say it

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=115751

But it sounds to me like he, and Mario Lemieux, got played by the NHLPA last week.

Now we all know the NHLPA is claiming that the NHL pulled the old bait and switch, but I'm not buying it. Why is that you might ask? Simple, one of the issues that the NHLPA is whining about (no salary floor in the latest NHL offer) was common knowledge. Heck, if I know about it, the NHLPA darn well should have known about it.

And the rest of the "issues" that the NHLPA opted to discuss instead of talking about a cap number have always been issues. Both sides have been arguing about things like revenue sharing, arbitration, and qualifying offers for about as long as they have been arguing about a salary cap.

The NHLPA tried to make the NHL look bad to the world. But honestly, with the truth starting the leak out, I think they've only made themselves look worse.

Coles wants out of Washington

News out of Washington is that Redskins WR Laveranues Coles wants to be released and is willing to forego a $5 million deferred signing bonus payment due next week to get it to happen.

The Redskins want to try to trade Coles and get something for him. However, Coles wants to control where he ends up and isn't willing to forego the bonus payment if the Redskins trade him.

That $5 million difference in a cap hit will likely cause the Redskins to change course a bit. But it will be interesting to see how this all plays out.

Will the Redskins get Coles to rework his deal and get a trade done to a team that Coles OKs?

Or, will they just take Coles up on the original release offer?

Or, will they force Coles to return and take his word that he'll play hard at face value?

Personally, I'd work with Coles to try and get a trade done to a team of his choice with a minimized cap hit. If that won't happen, then I'd release him.

It's not like the Redskins have won a whole lot with the guy on the team, even though he's played hard and played hurt.

Barry Bonds is a tool

So Barry doesn't believe that steroids can help a guy hit a baseball.

Now steroids won't make your hand-eye coordination any better. But, it will make you stronger. Which will help your bat speed. Which will help you turn on a fastball quicker. Which will help your hitting.

Barry, you know and I know that weight training has helped make the modern baseball player better than at any time in history. You know and I know that steroids help increase gains in weight training.

To me, there is a simple logical progression that follows from those two statements. If weight training makes you a better baseball player and steroids helps improves weight training, then steroids helps make you a better baseball player.

Now steroids won't turn a .200 hitter into a .300 hitter. But, it could turn a player like say Wade Boggs or Tony Gwynn into a big time HR hitter like say Barry Bonds.

The NHL and the NHLPA really topped themselves this weekend

I thought that the NHL and the NHLPA couldn't be dumb enough to cancel the entire 2004-05 season.

But apparently I vastly underestimated the stupidity of both sides.

How else to explain what happened Friday night and Saturday? Seriously, how stupid can these sides get? Don't they realize that by leaking news that the season would be un-canceled, only to see things go nowhere is only going to further embitter a fanbase that is at best completely fed up with the league and at worst so apathetic that they may never care again?

And will the media please save me the rants about how one side is to blame for this or being completely stubborn and inappropriate in their stance?

Both sides need a good old slap upside the head in an attempt to knock some sense into them.

The NHLPA needs the sense to realize that they've been vastly overcompensated under the previous CBA and that things have to change and will change with the next CBA.

To some extent, they do realize this. The 24% rollback in salaries is evidence of this.

However, their fight against changes to many of the inflationary parts of the previous CBA shows either ignorance of how the NHL got where it is today or a complete disregard for how much damage was done under the old CBA.

How else can you really explain a stance where the NHLPA fights against a link between salaries and revenues and then they whine that the NHL's unlinked cap offer won't allow the cap number to grow if revenues grow in the future?

To me, it's obvious that the NHLPA doesn't care about the health and well being of the league as a whole. What I don't get is why the NHLPA can't see that a healthy 30 team NHL is actually good for the vast majority of their membership.

If you feel that the NHLPA is a union, then this has to be the first union in history that places average pay as a higher priority than keeping the number of people that are employed steady over the long haul.

The NHL needs to be taken to task for the creative bookkeeping over the years that has led to the distrust of the owners by the players. Although, the NHLPA hasn't helped matters at all with their unwillingness to review the teams' books and their own creative bookkeeping that has a much more liberal view of "revenues in the game" than most accountants would accept.

The NHL also needs to be taken to task for their stand against meaningful revenue sharing. If the NHL really wants a league made up of 30 strong franchises where they are currently located, then there needs to be revenue sharing in the same neighborhood of what you see in the NFL where teams share 40% of gate receipts with the visiting club. The NHLPA makes a solid point when it says that the NHL owners don't want to be partners with each other, so why would we trust that they want to be partners with the players?

I hope both sides are happy. And I hope both sides get what they want in the end.

Honestly, I don't see how that happens right now. I think the revenues in the game will shrink to the point that both sides will end up making far less money in the future than if they had worked together and gotten a deal done to save the 2004-05 season.

Is this really over?

http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Hockey/NHL/Detroit/2005/02/17/933750.html

Steve Yzerman is holding out hope that a deal can get done in the next 24 to 48 hours.

There are rumors swirling of a player faction that is working to try and get a new offer to Bettman.

There has been reports of players that were trying to get through to Bob Goodenow to tell him to take the best deal he could get, but to cut a deal before yesterday, but that they were stonewalled.

And then you have Gary Bettman seemingly leaving the door open to the NHLPA to come back, perhaps with a cap offer at $45 million, when he was asked about a $45 million cap being acceptable to the players.

Perhaps this isn't really over.................................

The one question I wanted someone to ask Bob Goodenow yesterday

At his 4pm press conference yesterday, Bob Goodenow talked about how the NHLPA only wanted a "fair deal" and a "marketplace for players".

Well, the one question I wished that someone would have asked him was why is a cap at $49 million fair and a marketplace, yet a cap at $42.5 million isn't fair or doesn't create a marketplace?

I understood where the NHLPA was coming from with their non-cap stance. The marketplace issue made some sense, although I didn't agree with the take, when it was a systemic difference of opinion.

However, once the NHLPA reacted to the NHL's move to remove linkage between revenues and payrolls by offering up a salary cap system, the conflict was no longer a battle of principles and was merely a question of dollars and cents.

What made no sense to me was that once that gap was bridged, why didn't both sides lock themselves in a room and not leave until the numbers were workable for both sides?

I understood how that approach wouldn't have worked when one side was yelling "Cap" and the other was yelling "No Cap". But once that little charade was over, why couldn't they just sit down and hash out the numbers?

And quite honestly, I'd love to hear any player try and explain why $42.5 million per team isn't fair, yet $49 million per team is. At least that would provide me with some entertainment fr4om some people that are in the business of entertaining me.

At least they used to be in that business.........................

Some of my favorite links on the NHL killing itself yesterday

http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Hockey/NHL/2005/02/17/933775.html
http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Hockey/NHL/2005/02/17/933770.html

http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Hockey/NHL/2005/02/17/933768.html

Well, I guess they are dumber than I thought

NHL

Deceased: 2/16/2005

R.I.P.

A $6.5 million gap and about 3 hours to bridge it........

So here we are at the end of the poker match.

Bettman is staring down Goodenow and vice versa.

Both have people patting them on the back and yelling at them not to lose their shirts.

And the time keeps ticking with neither guy giving a tell.

But from where I stand, I can't see how either guy can let a deal not get done. They are simply too close and both sides have moved too far to see the season be cancelled when a deal is this close.

The NHL says it can't move off $42.5 million. The NHLPA is offering up $49 million. Can't we just split the difference at $45 or 46 million and get back to playing the games?

Is that really too much for hockey fans to get at this point?

It's not like the players or the owners are going to be panhandling any time soon should they even accept what the other side is offering.

In the end, I'm expecting sanity to rule the day.

But who knows what will happen when both guys flip their cards over...........................

Snatching a season from the claws of cancellation?

In a major movement yesterday the NHL put forth an offer of a $40 million salary cap and removed the linkage between league revenues and player salaries.

In response, the NHLPA offered up a hybrid tax/cap system that lowered the trigger point for luxury tax payments, upped the tax penalties, and included a hard cap at $52 million per team.

Despite the fact that neither deal was agreed to and that both sides said that no progress had been made, this can't be anything but good news after a weekend of nothing happening leading up to the scheduled press conference to cancel the season.

Maybe I'm being too optimistic, but both sides have made huge shifts in their previously hard line stances. The NHL has moved off the linkage issue. And the NHLPA has moved off their hardline stance against a salary cap.

The question now is whether or not there is enough time to craft together a comprimise deal to save what remains of a season.

Personally, I hope that both sides see that the best thing for each of them is to come up with a comprimise deal and get on with the business of playing hockey games. I'd expect a hybrid tax/cap deal that has a hard cap in the $42 to 45 million range should be good enough for both sides to live with for now.

The key will be whether both sides will prove to be dumber than I think they are. Honestly, I hope that isn't the case.

Next on my list of people the NY media needs to lay off is..............

Jason Giambi.

Who cares if he said the word steroids yesterday or not?

I don't.

All I care about is the fact that he said he was sorry and that he says that he wants to do right by the fans and his team in the future. As long as his actions back up his words, then I've got no beef with Giambi.

Heck, I'm not going to lie about it. If I were in his position, I probably would have done the same thing. It's not like he broke any of MLB's rules at they time that they were in place when he took THG and whatever else that he ingested and injected into his body to make more money than I'll ever see in my lifetime.

And at least he's being honest about that. I'll give Giambi a longer leash than guys who want to deny things that are becoming increasingly obvious every day.

And as much as the media wants to whine, I view steroid use in baseball prior to the last year or two akin to people driving over the speed limit every day. People know that they shouldn't do it. But, if nobody is going to call them on it, why should they change their behavior?

Especially since speeding saves people what, a minute a day and steriods can put millions of dollars in one's bank account.

The NY media should be hounding Gary Sheffield who continues to act like he didn't know what his trainer told him to take.

But you know that won't happen because Sheffield isn't the guy that hit .208 last season. He wasn't the guy that was hurt most of last season.

Apparently hitting the cover off of a baseball is more important than being a stand up guy and trying to be honest about how you've conducted yourself in the past.

If that's the way the NY media feels, then that tells me more about their moral fiber than it does about Giambi's.

The day the NHL died

Barring a miraculous last minute change of face by either the NHLPA or the NHL owners, the 2004-05 NHL season will be cancelled some time next week. And in doing so, the NHL and NHLPA will have successfully cut off their nose to spite their face.

Both sides know the league is in trouble. Both sides know that they can't estimate how much damage will be caused by the cancellation of the season. But somehow, both sides feel that jumping head first into that great unknown is somehow better for their side than working to reach a middleground in this fight between millionaires and billionaires to split up a $2 billion pie.

And once again I have to say shame on both sides for being so stubborn, short sighted, selfish, greedy, and ultimately stupid.

There is no good reason for this to have played out like it has.

There is no good reason that the NHLPA couldn't play under a salary cap system akin to what the NBA or NFL, and most pro sports, especially pro hockey, leagues in North America have.

Heck, locked out NHLers like Chris Chelios apparently have no problems playing in the ECHL which has a salary cap. So why should they take a stand against a salary cap in the NHL?

And there is no good reason that the NHL couldn't have foregone a hard cap in the short term in lieu of a revenue sharing and luxury tax system (albeit one with a lot stronger teeth in the revenue sharing portion) that was for only the short term. For instance, instead of having the CBA revert to a hard cap should certain financial triggers be tripped, why not just allow the CBA to be reopened by the NHL should they be hit?

At a minimum, that would give the owners even more ammunition in the next round of negotiations. Both in PR sense and a practical sense.

It will be a sad day when the NHL dies.

But I won't cry for the owners or the players. I'll cry for the working stiffs that make $10,000 a year off the game and have to go through financial hardships because the players don't feel it's fair to have their average salary capped at over $1 million per player per year. And that they have to go through hardships because of the fact that NHL owners can't stop themselves from spending on players like drunken sailors on shoreleave despite the fact that the Rangers and Blues and Leafs have proven that merely spending money will not allow you to sip from Lord Stanley's beer mug.

I'll also cry for my son and all the kids who are wondering why there isn't hockey on TV this year and why they can't go see their favorite players play at their local NHL arena.

I hope that both sides spend this offseason thinking about all the damage that they've done to the game they say they love and all the hurt they've brought to so many people that have helped line their pockets over the years and they hope to have line their pockets in the future.

The NHL gets a little more creative and the NHLPA says no thanks

Yesterday, Bob Goodenow and Bill Daly dropped by the NHLPA's head offices and offered up to implement the NHLPA's last offer IF they would agree to switch to the NHL's last offer if some financial trigger points were hit to prove that, in the NHL's opinion, the NHLPA's system didn't work.

http://www.nhlcbanews.com/news/nhl_compromise020905.html

As expected, the NHLPA dismissed the notion because they felt that the trigger points would easily be hit.

Here is my analysis of where things are at currently given the contract data placed on NHLPA.com:

Based purely on salary numbers posted on NHLPA.com today, there are 4 teams that would likely break the $42 million threshold even with the 24% rollback.

Toronto has 21 players signed that would put them at over $47 million after the rollback.

NJ has 23 players signed that would put them at over $45.5 million after the rollback.

Philadelphia has 19 players signed that would put them at almost $45.5 million after the rollback.

Detroit has 19 players signed that would put them at just over $42 million after the rollback.

And teams like Dallas and the NY Rangers could easily top the $42 million mark by merely filling out their rosters even after the rollback.

If that $42 million threshold includes all player compensation (base salary + bonuses, insurance, pension, etc.), then I highly doubt that trigger wouldn't be hit the first season that the triggers can be hit.

Also, after the rollback the average team salary is at just over $27.5 million. However, teams only average 18.5 players under contract, so that average team compensation number might be in danger as well.

I also think that 33% gap between the top 3 and the bottom 3 payrolls is all but guaranteed to be triggered as well.Right now the top 3 would average in the $45 to 46 million range. And after everyone gets signed, my guess is that the bottom 3 would average less than $30 million. As is, the bottom 3 would be averaging around $11 million per team after the rollback. Although, those teams have more roster spots to fill than the top 3.

I can agree with the NHLPA's assertion that accepting this deal would basically be agreeing to the NHL's last offer that they've already turned down. However, I don't believe Bob Goodenow when he says that this proposal couldn't be the basis for an agreement.

This offer by the NHL puts forth the first true framework for a comprimise, IMO. There has to be a way that this deal can be tweaked such that it is palatable for the NHLPA.

Heck, add a clause that says that if the trigger is tripped to kick the NHL's cap system into effect, the NHLPA then has the right to end this CBA after the same number of cap years have been played out as there were non-cap years. Basically, if the NHLPA's offer is in place for only 1 season, the NHLPA would have the right to end the CBA after one season under the NHL's system.

There has to be a way to get things done. Especially after this major move by the NHL.

The NHL also put forth a drop dead date

At the same meeting the NHL also said that if a deal was agreed to this weekend, that the season would be cancelled.

There are many fans and members of the media that are happy about this.

Personally, I'll be happy if the setting of a deadline forces both sides to get a deal done.

Patriots win the game and TO gets mad respect

As most expected (except apparently anyone that Rodney Harrison and many of the Patriots players heard in their heads), the New England Patriots won their 3rd Super Bowl in the last 4 years.

They played their usual solid team game and forced their opponent to make more critical mistakes than they did.

But to me at least, this game will be about TO and his ankle. So many talking heads didn't believe TO's talk that he'd play and that he'd be very effective.

Some even suggested that TO was being selfish by insisting on playing when his doctor refused to clear him. They said that he was putting himself before the team in that he wanted the spotlight even though someone else could use his roster spot more effectively.

Well, I think there should be a baker somewhere cooking up a whole lot of crow pie right about now. Not only did TO play, he was to me at least, far and away the best player in an Eagles uniform and he would hve gotten my vote as the game's MVP.

If busting your rear end to come back from surgery faster than anyone, including your doctor, thinks that you can, taking a pain killing injection to get on the field, and then playing like you merely sprained your ankle is selfish, then I want the Redskins to load up on selfish guys this offseason.

Mike Golic said it best this morning when he said that TO was a football player. Golic went on to explain that that is the highest form of compliment that he can give a guy in the NFL.

I have to agree. TO did what pretty much everyone said he couldn't do. And he should have proven every single one of his doubters wrong.

But, you know that TO's 'tude rubs many the wrong way. And so while others are called team players, TO will continue to get labelled as a selfish big mouth.

But to me at least, TO's actions in this Super Bowl, and all season, have spoken much louder than his words. And that's really tough.

My star of the day goes to...............

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=113530

Kevin Kerr

It is utterly laughable that locked out NHLers will go play in a league with a salary cap like the UHL when they've said that they won't accept a salary cap in the NHL.

The NHL needs to get more creative

So here is the NHL's latest proposal that took the NHLPA about 2.5 seconds to reject:

http://www.nhlcbanews.com/news/proposal_release020205.html

It was pretty much the offer that was rumored to be put forth.

Now I'm wondering why that is. The NHL had to know that they would have to get a lot mroe creative than they did if they were going to have any shot at settling this dispute.

Now I know that linkage is the NHL's sacred cow. Whereas the NHLPA appears to have at least 3 sacred cows (guaranteed contracts, arbitration, and no linkage). Given that linkage is the NHL's sacred cow, I wouldn't expect anything less than their offer having that as the centerpiece.

But to make that more palatable to the players, the NHL should have taken the 24% rollback off the table. And really, with the NHL's offer of an escrow system to maintain that 55% of league revenues go to players, the rollback isn't needed to maintain the NHL's cost certainty.

I also would have made a huge move in the age for UFA. The NHL offered to move the age for UFA from 31 to 30. The NHL can also opt to get rid of arbitration all together if they are willing to move the age for UFA to 28.

To make a big splash, I would have offered up UFA after 5 years of service. I know many people think that more players on the UFA will be inflationary, but I disagree. The law of supply and demand would suggest that a larger supply will work to put a drag on costs.

Besides, if you get linkage, it won't matter in the long run because players will have their total pay out capped at 55% of league revenues.

If the NHL is true to their word that if they get linkage, they'll be willing to talk about any other issue, then they should have put those words to action in their last offer. As it stands today, they didn't put forth an offer that appears to made even the player reps think twice about.

And that was a wrong move.

Unless the NHL was never interested in playing this season like the NHLPA has suggested all along................................