NHL Arbitration becoming a roll of the dice

This past week, we’ve heard of several players working out one and two year deals with their clubs to avoid arbitration. Ian White, Gilbert Brule, Ben Eager, Andrew Ladd, Anton Stralman, Matt Moulson, Peter Regin, Mason Raymond and Tomas Fleischmann all reached agreements with their respective teams this week, while Blake Wheeler, Tim Kennedy and Jannik Hansen all went through arbitration and their terms were accepted by their respective clubs.

Clarke MacArthur, on the other hand, was awarded a 1 year, 2.4 million dollar deal from arbitration that the Atlanta Thrashers walked away from. The Chicago Blackhawks are going to spin the wheel on Antti Niemi and hope that the arbitrator doesn’t compare him favourably to Jaroslav Halak, who recently signed a deal worth 3.75 million per season. It seems that in the new cap era, many NHL clubs are afraid of what the arbitrator could do in such a situation, messing their cap by giving inflated amounts to certain players, but they also don’t want to allow assets to walk away for nothing.

Arbitration is also a relatively unsettling process, as the NHL clubs need to downplay the players’ accomplishments or find a comparable player at their desired salary, while the players and agents need to talk up the past and potential accomplishments of the player. The issue, it seems, is that many teams don’t want to ‘trash talk’ the player or his abilities and then have to turn around and try to negotiate a deal with the player the following year.

Some seem to go off without a hitch. Peter Chiarelli had no problems with Blake Wheeler going to arbitration because he is a valuable asset to the organization and they had the space to keep him. Chicago, whose cap woes are already finely detailed, could not afford the expected arbitration amounts on players like Eager and Ladd, and had to move them. While Niemi did help them win a cup, it seems that they could be taking the Detroit Red Wing philosophy in that great defense can compensate for average goaltending. They have locked up a core that includes Norris winner Duncan Keith, fellow team Canada gold medalist Brent Seabrook, Brian Campbell and Niklas Hjalmarsson all to long term deals.

So, should Niemi get his payday from the arbitrator (and many suspect that it will be close to the 3 million dollar range), do the Blackhawks let him walk and sign one of the freely available UFA goalies like Marty Turco or Jose Theodore to slightly less, knowing the appeal of playing for the defending cup champs? Or perhaps the Hawks could accept the contract and peddle him to another club looking for goaltending help. Do the Halak and Niemi signings / arbitration amounts determine what Montreal does with Carey Price? Neither the Habs nor Price wanted to go to arbitration, but that situation is seemingly in a holding pattern, as the Habs basically appointed him the #1 job, but aren’t ready to pay him #1 money.

I believe the awarding of 2.4 million to Clarke MacArthur, whose stats (16 goals, 19 assists for 35 points) seem to be a little out of sync with the dollar amount, could have sent GM’s into a frenzy, worried that most of the arbitrations would end up going in favour of the players. Several deals have come right down to the wire, with the player signing on the day the arbitration hearing was supposed to have been held. The NHL landscape itself has created this environment, as many GM’s are expecting cap volatility while others are preparing for the expiry of the CBA at the end of next season.

Ultimately, with a lot of one year deals being signed, this is only going to compound the problem next year, and we could see a lot more movement among the RFA ranks than we have in previous years as GM’s struggle to get the best deals out of their player salary budget. With big dollars being thrown around, it seems that a GM’s best chance at better value is to work out a deal with the player themselves, with Brule being a perfect example. His numbers (17 goals, 20 assists for 37 points) were very similar to those of MacArthur’s, but settled on a two year deal worth 1.85 million per season, or 29% less than what MacArthur was awarded.

With hearings ending on August the 4th, most of the names have been taken care of, but it seems that arbitration carries with it a lot of risk in the new NHL landscape and it will only spur further player movement, either through trade or free agency.

Popularity: 1%

Related posts: