If you open the NHL standings page at Sportsnet.ca, you will also notice that 10 of these 16 teams are in playoff places and that three others are right in the bubble, fighting with their fingernails and teeth for a chance to make it. Now, ask yourself: Do you think there is a real appetite among the majority of league general managers to close the LTIR gap that allows them to exceed the pay ceiling? Since this is written in the CBA, they could not do it — even if they wanted to — without the signatures of the players. And we can not see the players very interested in giving this indication without any significant concession from the league to do so. But we deviate. While some general managers sitting around the table for Tuesday’s three-hour meeting may have expressed their displeasure to see Nikita Kucherov boast that Tampa Bay Lightning was $ 18 million above the ceiling and won the Stanley Cup 2021, no there is a real desire to retire with LTIR mechanisms. The issue was not even discussed during the GM’s seven hours together for Monday’s meeting, and it only took about 30 minutes from Tuesday’s meeting. “We all sometimes focus on prejudice,” said Calgary Flames GM Brad Treliving. “The reality is that we had a ceiling for 17 years and if there was a gray area of it, it was maybe once or twice. “Now, is it reasonable to say that we reach the playoffs and have a ceiling of $ 81.5 million and that basically means that we should only be able to dress $ 81.5 million in the playoffs? Sure, that makes sense. I think you should go back and study it. I think in areas where you came back and said that LTI was abused, really, what were those? “And the championship does a very good job. you can not just put someone in the LTI and add to your cap without the championship going through that with a fine-toothed comb. There were legal injuries. There are some things you can do with the system set up. I do not consider it abusive. Are there points that need to be tightened up? It may. “But the feeling in the room there was not that it was radically broken.” The fact that Tampa became the child of the poster for seemingly abusing the system, with Kucherov losing all last season after the hip and then appearing in game 1 of the playoffs, is obviously strict because the Lightning won the Cup. No one said disapproval of the Montreal Canadians spending well on LTI as they reached the 2021 final. Both Lightning and Canadiens were two of the 11 teams that entered last year’s playoffs and surpassed the limit via LTI. Lightning GM Julien BriseBois remarked. “If we had not won the Cup last season, we might not have been the poster child,” he said. “But I would rather win the Stanley Cup and be the kid on the poster anyway, knowing that these situations have happened in the past. In 2015 we played with the Chicago Blackhawks in the final and they had the example of Patrick Kane then and won the Cup. The situation we had last year with Kucherov — there are 32 teams and it happens. There are many groups in LTI, so it is not a matter of groups deliberately trying to take advantage of LTI. It is more a function of not raising the salary cap and the clubs already have financial commitments to the players that need to be respected, and this puts a lot of pressure on everyone. “It was not long before we were building our teams while holding a pillow to invite players, but none of us can do it anymore. We are no different from anyone else when you look at the cap for all the other teams. “Most teams had to exceed the ceiling at some point this season.” Even with the salary cap rising by $ 1 million next season, long-term injuries will continue to affect many teams and likely force them to use LTIR as a tool to stay competitive. Commissioner Gary Bettman has no problem with that. He had no problem using LTIR from Lightning last year and said on Tuesday that he has no problem with how the Vegas Golden Knights use it this year. Yes, Vegas has three players with LTIR-defined salaries. And yes, it seems very convenient that Mark Stone and his $ 9.5 million salary are there and it was before the Golden Knights swapped Jack Eichel and his $ 10 million salary. But we are sure that the Golden Knights would prefer to have Stone in their lineup, as they face injuries of Max Pacioretty, Robin Lehner, Reilly Smith and Bradyen McNabb, and hardly cling to the last position of the playoffs in the Western Conference. And it’s not that they — or any other team — are lying about injuries. “It is no secret that at every transaction deadline we contact the clubs and understand their injury status and have a sense of the expected return dates,” Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly said on Tuesday. “And every time the expected return date and LTIR are used and the expected return date is around the playoffs, we look at it. We deal with the clubs, we get their medical records, we hire an independent medical expert and we take care (details are accurate about) of the injury. We have never had any problems arising from this. “But it is a thorough process.” It will not change. In the same way the LTIR mechanism is unlikely to change. At least not immediately. “It’s not something that is going to be a major issue anytime soon,” Bettman said. The NHL will not stand in the way of teams with Russian prospects Not that we expected Bettman or Daly to say the opposite, but we wanted to get the official word of the tournament on how to deal with the drafting of the Russian perspective as long as the country’s invasion of Ukraine remains in full swing. “Look, it’s an evolving situation,” Daly said. “People may look different in July than they do today, so let’s see where we are then. But it is not our current intention to put restrictions on Russian players who will be called up to the draft.” Whether or not the teams will be willing to select one of the 15 Russian players ranked by the NHL’s central scouting to be among the top 50 European skaters is another story. Whether they would get the three Russian goalkeepers ranked in the top 10 is up for debate. The recruitment of any players from Russia is an issue that should be thoroughly considered by each GM and its respective staff, and this is not due to political trends. As Treliving said, you can draft Russian players and he does not think anyone should be banned from doing so. But Treliving also said: “The biggest problem is your ability to access these players — and that’s because of the bricks and mortar of visas and all that stuff. That’s something you have to take into account. “ As we get closer and closer to July, this will become an important internal discussion for each group. It will be exciting to see how he will eventually play in Montreal, the city that will host the 2022 Draft. The NHL is working on the 2024 Hockey World Cup Daly said a preliminary plan for the 2024 Hockey World Cup was submitted to the GMs on Tuesday, but that it is fluid and needs to be accelerated to find key details in the hammer to bring the event to life. We do not know exactly when it will happen, even if we know that the goal is 2024. We also do not know where it will happen. And the format of the tournament is being considered, according to Daly. He shared that, this time, it will be just a country-by-country event. Rest in Peace, North American Under-23 Team and Europe Team. We hardly knew you. Summer World Junior will miss key players We did not discuss this issue with many GMs, but we did speak with the supervisor of Canada’s player in the tournament that was disrupted last winter. We asked Montreal Canadiens GM Kent Hughes how he felt about allowing Kaiden Guhle to play in the World Juniors in mid-August, just before he came to the NHL training camp. “I think in the case of Guhle, I talked to him in Edmonton after his game (March 4) and it was quite shocking how much hockey he had to play and should play. The Memorial Cup is coming so late (late June) and the recovery time is very short (if the Oil Kings can do it). It’s almost like 18 months of direct hockey. “It’s not optimal, for sure. If you ask if, as an organization, we have a position or that we would suggest not to participate, we did not have this discussion. It is not so simple if the player wants to go and represent his country. We will deal with it later and he may have his own thoughts about it “. In case Guhle unreservedly wants to participate, we asked Hughes if he could see the tournament as a springboard to the player training camp. “It could be,” he said. “But we are not so worried about the training camp. We are worried about the development during the year and we just make sure that he does not fall down and get injured. “ Again, we did not discuss this issue with too many GMs. But you have to think that many of them have the same concerns.
