I’d rather have a say in my future than have it dictated, too – but why should that just be an argument for Tavares and the Islanders this year? Why shouldn’t it apply to a number five draft pick who goes to a team that is notorious for not developing players well, and so he knows his career will not be looked after properly? Or a team that chooses tenth, but he doesn’t like the coaching staff and hates the city? If you are going to make that argument, then follow it through to its logical conclusion and abolish the draft entirely, letting all young players have a say in which team and organization would be the right fit for them – same as other professions.

Otherwise, how are the Islanders supposed to get better if not for drafting young talent? They can’t buy their way out of putridity – the only way available is to build from the draft. If that is not to be permitted, then just contract the team now and spare their fans any more pain.

John Tavares and the London Knights played in Ottawa yesterday and one of the Islander scouts was in attendance surveying the goods. I had a chance to chat with him during the WJHC and teased him that Ottawa was going to have a good shot at Tavares too. He replied that Ottawa didn’t need a player like John. I also had a chance to mention John’s prospects in Ottawa to John’s dad and his eyes glazed over.

I think they want to go to Toronto.

As for having a choice, players are pretty much chattel from the time they are drafted until (if) they get good enough to negotiate an NTC/NMC in their contracts. That’s just how it goes. If you give the draftees the right to choose where they land, you might as well give it to all the guys. That would pretty much clog it up.

Whether the team that places DFL “deserves” the first pick, well, there’ s a reason that there is a lottery.

I dont think the Islanders should get revenue sharing. I dont think its wildly accurate to look at average attendance to judge a team because buildings vary in size and some seat 2,000 to 3,000 more people than others. The percent to capacity is a much better indicator of how a team is doing in this regard. This distinction is important as there are 5 teams that play below 85% capacity (Islanders, Carolina, Columbus, Florida, and Atlanta… Phoenix sits right at 85). The Devils who you say are at a disadvantage are turning a profit with a small arena (17,625) that is filled about 88 capacity on average. They have seen an uptick in revenue since the lockout and there was a recent post on this site about most of that was due to last season, when they moved to the Prudential Center. They are on track to turn a profit again this year and while still not selling out every game have gone from 80% capacity in the Meadowlands to almost 90% in Newark. Partially based on this Id say the Islanders need a new arena, not revenue sharing.

In terms of the restriction, Im not in agreement with it but it is currently in the CBA and teams need to deal with it. Other teams in similar situations are making it work, so its not impossible for the Islanders to turn a profit.

No. The Islanders should not be eligible for revenue sharing, at least not as the system is currently structured. If they are, then incentives are completely out of whack.

I’m in favor of significant revenue sharing, but I’m opposed to it in the form that every league has set it up. As is, it subsidizes incompetence.

The pay in for revenue sharing should be based on one thing only: the revenue potential of the market. It absolutely should not be based upon how much revenue is actually generated. If you could generate a lot of revenue, but don’t, that’s a sign of a poorly run organization. The league needs to force bad ownership out, not prop it up. The fact that you can’t take advantage of the revenue potential should not only not entitle you to receive pay outs, it shouldn’t relieve the responsibility of paying in. You want a big market team, generate revenues like a big market team.

The pay out for revenue sharing should be based upon only one thing: winning percentage. Reward owners for putting together good teams. That’s what their incentive should be. I can see doing it on a multi-year rolling average of winning percentage, in order to smooth out revenues over the success cycle. It needs to be about winning.

Yes, that means that large market teams are going to collect revenue sharing checks. Deal with that by escalating the pay in structure. It’s possible to ensure that they are net payers even with this payout structure.

The key is marginal revenue per win. The reason big market teams want to pay a lot of money for players isn’t quite that it’s just a large market. It’s that, because it’s a large market, every win is more valuable to them. Attendance, and TV audience, go up for every team that wins. For a big market team, each bit of increase is a larger set of fans, and greater advertising revenue.

The point of a revenue sharing system should be to even this out. If you collect money from teams that should be generating a lot of revenue, and pay it to teams that win, you can make this a much flatter curve. Pay Edmonton to win from the league’s central revenues, and you can come closer to making each win worth as much as it is for the Rangers. You’ll never catch them up completely, but close.

Along those lines, you’ll never convince me that a team in the New York City metro area doesn’t have a lot of revenue potential that the Islanders have managed to avoid collecting. Yes, there are a lot of teams, but there are even more people. Per capita, New York is underserved relative to other markets, not the other way around.

Going to the Coliseum from NYC is far worse than going to Kanata from Ottawa. The Islanders serve suburban Long Island with traffic congestion that makes it nearly impossible to serve the entire NY metro area. Lack of infrastructure to get people out to the parking lot by mass transit really hurts. No way to make it to game time if you are travelling from four out of five boroughs during the week. Long Island is NOT Manhattan and the Town of Hempstead intends to keep it that way even if it means slowly killing the Islanders until the leas at the Coliseum is up.

The Islanders lease will not allow them to just up leave for the foreeable future and so the idea of relocating isn’t really an option either. However, the terms of the lease should prevent them from being profitable. Whomever signed that lease should be shot and the NHL that “vetted” the string of criminals that have owned the team should be held accountable as well. These weren’t just inept owners they were people that were actually sent to prison and the NHL approved them. The point is, the arena was built in the current location almost 40 years ago and has not been updgrade since. So the location hasn’t changed but the living conditions have certainly deteriorated under numerous slum lords.

….will take several teams out behind the bard and put bullets in their heads.

The only mystery is how many teams will die.

though if Shakespeare were involved it would be something to see.

For those of you not familiar with the area, the Isles draw almost nothing from NYC and other suburbs. It’s a Long Island-based franchise, basically Nassau and Suffolk, with a tiny bit of support in Queens and Brooklyn.

The Isles have the worst lease in hockey. They get no concessions, parking, signage, etc. They do get the luxury boxes (all 33 of them) — that was the deal a previous owner made.

The Coliseum was built on the cheap and nor maintained through most of the 1980s and 1990s. Current ownership has tried to overcome some of the building’s inadequacies and decay, but there’s only so much they can do.

However, this is not Nashville/Atlanta/Sunrise, etc. There is significant hockey history on Long Island (Simmons seems to ignore this completely). There is also a good-sized fan base that will turn out when there’s a product worth watching. They are starting to accumulate some good kids. Tavares (or Hedman) would speed up the process, as Crosby did it Pittsburgh.

They also have an enormous TV contract – I suspect that, not the 6 years left on their lease, will keep them from moving (though if I were Wang, I’d move further out on the Island — there is no other place to build in Nassau County). For the posters who think Wang should just buy some land and build — there’s nothing available in Nassau, and building anywhere out here is a hassle.