there is a 7.5% cushion that covers player bonuses.
calculate:
roll over=players salaries in all this year + player bonuses earned this year (*) -salary cap *1.075.
If roll over > 0 it rolls over to the next year
(*)--players 35+ contracts can be structured differently where their bonuses will not count this year but the following year like Iginla in Boston.
(*)--I think there are some bonuses that are exempt from the cap such as the bonus money in contracts for making all star teams or winning awards.
yes when they exceed the 7.5% cushion it rolls over to the next year
I'm pretty sure none of this is right. Potential bonuses count against the salary cap, until they can no longer be earned. Teams are allowed to exceed the cap by a maximum of 7.5% due to bonuses that may be earned. Any bonuses in excess of that amount,
must be accounted for under the actual upper limit. This idea that the overage/rollover is based on exceeding the bonus cushion is flat out nonsense. The actually earned bonuses can
never put a team over the bonus cushion, because the bonuses that could be earned
must not put a team over the 7.5% bonus cushion.
I am pretty sure that it works like this: Let's suppose a $73M cap, like there is now. So a team can exceed that cap by $5.475M solely due to potential bonuses. So that means that there is, practically speaking a cap of $78.475M, but the averaged club salary, less performance bonuses, cannot exceed $73M. If a team has $7M in performance bonuses, then the averaged club salary, less performance bonuses
cannot exceed $71.475M. That is, any bonuses in excess of that 7.5% cushion must be accounted for under the actual upper limit.
It is not, as you seem to be interpreting it, that teams can spend as much on performance bonuses as they want and anything in excess of that 7.5% cushion rolls over to the next year. It's that teams cannot spend more on salary and potential bonuses than that upper limit + 7.5% cushion,
period. The rollover happens when performance bonuses that are earned put a team over the upper limit. So a team with, let's say, $71M in non-performance bonus salary, and $3M in bonuses earned, would be over the upper limit by $1M and have their upper limit the next season reduced by the same amount.
As to your other points:
1) Bonuses for 35+ players are not "structured" to count against the cap the next year, per se. They just work by the same bonus rules as other contracts. It's just that teams can choose to sign 35+ players to one year contracts, with bonuses, so that if they are strapped for cap space, they can take advantage of the bonus cushion and rollover. It's just making use of the way the bonus rules operate. There is nothing special about how the contracts are written though. While deferred bonuses are a thing, and are paid later, they are charged to the cap in the season in which they are earned.
2) No, bonuses paid for making all star teams or winning awards are not "cap exempt". Those are schedule B bonuses, and are explicitly mentioned alongside schedule A bonuses in the relevant sections of the CBA. It's just that some schedule B bonuses are
paid by the league. They are still charged against a team's cap, however.
I think LTIRs count as part of this calculation. If not, then why are they even on the books? from an accounting standpoint these LTIRs should in essence be transfers to an NHLPA salary roll and not counted against the team in any way Even on a month long LTIE\R (like what Washington had to do last year with 2 of their players. Then this NHL operated pool of salaries then counts agains the players share but these players do not count against the roster of the team in nay way.
LTIR players count against the cap and the players' share. Teams are allowed to add players to the roster to replace a player who has been placed on LTIR. Those replacement players cannot have total salary and bonuses exceeding those of the player being replaced. Adding those replacement players, however, can allow a team to exceed the upper limit.
Let's say, hypothetically, the Sabres were sitting at $71M prior to opening day (not counting performance bonuses covered by the bonus cushion). Then, Matt Moulson pulled something while giving Eichel a push on his swing set and it was deemed he would be out for long enough to merit LTIR. The Sabres could then add a player, or players, whose cap hit was up to $5M as replacements for Moulson while he's on LTIR. The Sabres could, under such circumstances, end up having an averaged club salary of $76M due to those replacement players.
