Does Alex Radulov have to clear waivers? You can bet Ken Holland thinks so

There is apparently a fair bit of dissatisfaction among NHL GMs about the news that Alex Radulov has been allowed to return to Nashville without clearing waivers. The decision was made by a joint agreement between the NHL and the NHLPA.

Article 13-23 of the CBA states:

In the event a professional or former professional Player plays in a league outside North America after the start of the NHL Regular Season, other than on Loan from his Club, he may thereafter play in the NHL during that Playing Season (including Playoffs) only if he has first either cleared or been obtained via Waivers. For the balance of the Playing Season, any such Player who has been obtained via Waivers may be Traded or Loaned only after again clearing Waivers or through Waiver claim.

Pretty cut and dried: As a player who was playing in the KHL on a non-loan arrangement, Radulov should be caught by this section (his combination of NHL games played and age mean that he is no longer protected by an exemption).

You can bet the most incensed GM has to be Detroit's Ken Holland, for two reasons:

1. When the Red Wings signed Evgeni Nabokov last year, he was claimed by the Islanders off waivers on this very same rule (Nabokov had played in Europe earlier in the season).

2. The Red Wings are almost certain to face the Predators in the first round of the playoffs.

You can bet Ken Holland is spending his day yelling at Gary Bettman and Bill Daly and anyone else who will listen. This could get messy (though it would be tricky, as the NHL, not the teams, is the signatory to the CBA). Exempting the Preds from a waiver rule that was enforced just a year ago is pretty greasy stuff.

Is Alexander Radulov really still on an Entry-Level Contract (ELC)?

Multiple sources reported this week that Alex Radulov could be returning to the Nashville Predators before the end of the season, after four successful seasons in Russia. When Radulov was last here, he put up 26 goals and 58 points as a 21-year-old. He led the KHL in scoring last season and could easily be a first-line scorer for the Preds right away.

What caught my attention, though, is that Radulov is still technically on his entry-level contract. Having played only two years before bolting to Russia, he owes the Predators another year at $980,000.

This came as a surprise to me; I expected there might be some sort of out clause on ELCs when a player disappeared for several years. Yet when I looked at Article 9.1(d)(iii) of the CBA, I found this:

In the event a Player ceases to render his playing services called for under his SPC (except as a result of injury, illness or disability) during such period that he is in the Entry Level System, then during such non-playing period, the Player's number of years in the Entry Level System shall be extended for a period equal to the remaining unfulfilled portion of his SPC.

So there you have it; while Entry Level contracts can run when a team sends a player to the minors, they will be on hold if players hold out or play elsewhere of their own volition.

The Preds have agreed that they will consider Radulov's ELC to be fulfilled if he plays this season and playoffs, and so he will be eligible for a substantial RFA contract in the offseason. It would be interesting to see what would happen if the Preds argued that the ELC would apply until March of next year; we might see this issue clarified in the next CBA.

You can't keep a good man down...or can you?

Justin Bourne published an interesting piece this past week asking whether NHL GMs and coaches ever consciously suppress the point-scoring opportunities of their players to keep costs down at contract time.

It's a little sorry to consider: would a team actually choose not to put its best players on the ice to save a buck? Generally, I think most of us would think that teams would avoid it, not wanting to mess with a player's development or alienate their rising stars.

Certainly, we've seen it in the past in baseball; the famous 1918 'Black Sox' scandal was partly prompted by Charles Comiskey's decision to hold Eddie Cicotte back to prevent him from getting a bonus for winning 30 games the year before. But those were the bad old days, before players' unions and any sort of grievance process. To make such actions work today, teams would have to be much more careful.

So is hockey free from such contract manipulation for the most part? No. Teams regularly hold back players who are good enough to play more.

It happens most often in the handling of entry-level players: under the CBA, teams have the option to 'slide' players on entry-level contracts and defer their RFA status by a year. Players can be sent back to junior or held in the AHL; so long as they don't play ten or more NHL games, their contract doesn't start to run. Most of the time, holding these players back is a perfectly legitimate action; they might be too small, or the team might want them to get a lot of ice time at a lower level so they can develop their skills. But every year, there are some players - Mark Scheifele this year is one example - who might be able to handle the NHL game but are sent down because teams want to avoid starting the service clock.

We see this, of course, in baseball as well. Case in point: Brett Lawrie waited in AAA for much of the 2011 season while the Blue Jays played a series of .200 hitters at third base. Lawrie came up, and put up big numbers as expected. While the Blue Jays stated that they thought Lawrie needed some time to work on his defense (and recover from an injury), his biggest problem was more that he would cost the team a lot more in arbitration if they allowed his service clock to start running too soon. Both the NHL's 'sliding' rule and MLB's 'super-two' arbitration rules deprive teams and fans of the services of players who are good enough to play.

As for the situations that Bourne discusses in his article, though, I'm not so sure. He wonders if players like Jordan Staal and Sam Gagner could be held back to avoid big contract paydays. Generally, my experience has shown that there's usually a fair bit of distance between management and the coaching staff. While GMs might want to restrain a player, coaches are looking out for their own necks and trying to win. If they leave a good player on the bench, coaches are hurting themselves. It's one thing if a player is in the minors; but if Sam Gagner gets benched in the third period of a big game, fans will notice and everyone looks bad. It's much easier for a team to deflect PR flak for players in the minors because they can always be referred to as 'needing more development time'.

Further to Bourne's points, the lineup decisions are typically dictated by other factors anyway. While Staal could play on the wing with Crosby or Malkin, the Penguins recognize that he's very strong defensively, and so does everyone else. Come contract time, I think there's little doubt Staal will be paid fairly. Besides, he's so good as a centre that it has made more sense to move Malkin to the wing instead.

As for Gagner, he has played on the top line, but when Nugent-Hopkins is healthy, he's a clear second choice. Even with RNH in the lineup, he has seen 1st-unit PP time anyway. Judging from the Oilers' decisions to keep Hall and RNH in the NHL as 18-year-olds (and thus missing out on the chance to 'slide' their contracts), it's clear that they aren't aiming to pull a fast one. The team has a vested interest in showcasing their future stars sooner rather than later. Edmonton fans will only tolerate losing for so long before they get a glimpse of the future. Playing the best players will mean more ticket sales, more jersey sales, and better TV ratings. The Oilers are a losing team but they're fun to watch even for someone like myself who cheers for a rival. It's the same reason teams will make a public push to get their players chosen for the All-Star game or given an end-of-season award. As much as we like to focus on the salary cap side of things, teams are running a business and part of that is generating excitement among the fans.

Hodgson, Kassian, and the cap

I'm a little late to the party on this one - all of three days - but the Hodgson-Kassian trade is something that has been a hot topic, obviously, so what better way to kick off our actual analysis?

There's not much consensus in the media and the blogosphere about whether the Canucks made out well in this trade; everyone seems to agree that it's a skill-for-size deal, but it's so much more than that. Other opinions vary widely; here's a few things I think it's not:

- It's not simply a 'win-now' deal. The Pahlsson trade was 'win-now'; he's a player who will be useful in the playoffs and will likely be gone next year. Kassian's value this year will be limited; granted, he's expected to play in a mostly 4th-line, physical role, but do you think the Canucks are really relying on a 21-year-old to be their key physical guy? If they were so concerned about getting that sort of player, I'd suspect they probably could have gotten a Steve Ott-type player if they were willing to part with Hodgson. Kassian, obviously, gives much more future value. Craig Button has criticized the Canucks for being too obsessed with getting more physical to beat the Bruins; sure, they've done that, but it seems more likely that there's more going on. In a way, I'll grant that Hodgson was not the player the Canucks need right now: a centre who needs ice time, but who isn't quite there yet defensively and is poor on faceoffs.

- It's not the Canucks giving up on Hodgson because of a trade request or bad blood; instead, they saw a chance to cash out on what had been a volatile asset. As Cam Charron put it, they're selling high on him. His past injury problems could re-surface any time. He had a very hot January and his perceived value shot up as if he was becoming the player he was always supposed to be. He may well continue to improve in Buffalo, but he might also fall apart. Back injuries don't just disappear.

Instead, I'll put it to you this way: the deal was all about the cap. Hodgson is making $1.66m this year and next, and will be due a big raise - to somewhere between $3-6 million, depending how he does in Buffalo. As a third-line centre, he's not a great bargain at $1.66m now; as a second-line centre, he won't be a great bargain at $3-6m.

The Canucks are in the enviable position of having lots of NHL talent and plenty of prospects coming down the pipe. Their cap situation is going to be very tight for the foreseeable future. The management knows this, and probably saw Hodgson as a guy who was going to be taking up cap space without much chance that they'd be able to turn a 'profit' (i.e., get enough performance out of him that he would be a salary-cap bargain) on him. Zack Kassian is totally different: he's in the first year of his ELC, which pays him a very modest $870k.

I was lucky enough to meet Laurence Gilman a couple weeks ago - he was discussing the salary arbitration process and Mason Raymond came up as an example. Rather than talking much about how the arbitration went, though, Gilman couldn't stop talking about how thrilled they were to have Raymond in 09-10 when he scored 25 goals for a mere $883k cap hit.

The key wasn't that Raymond potted 25 goals - but that he did it for such a low price. Let's say a typical 25-goal scorer would earn about $4m - Raymond provided it for a $3m discount. The Canucks could then use that cap space to pay for an upgrade from, say, Nolan Baumgartner ($550k salary that year) to Christian Ehrhoff ($3.5m), which is exactly what they did.

So getting productive players for small cap hits can give your team a real bonus. That's what I think Gilman sees in Kassian: his next Mason Raymond - a second/third line winger who can be productive for less than a million bucks.

Sami Salo ($2m) is a UFA this summer and may retire; the Canucks can use the savings on Kassian to replace him with a $4-5m defender. Or the money may be needed simply for raises to Raymond and Gragnani.

So there you have it. Acquiring Kassian isn't just because he's a physical player, and not just because Hodgson wanted out. It could be as much about the money as anything else.

Welcome to the blog!

Hello World!

This is the first post to NHL Capologist - a blog where I'll be taking a closer look at NHL salary cap and CBA topics. I'm a Canucks fan, so many of our posts will be Canucks-centric, though I'll be weighing in on cap news league-wide.

Thanks for reading!