Would a soccer style loan system work in the NHL?

[Kshahdoo]

Basically, Team A has a player under contract that they want to keep in future years, but for whatever reason they are OK with loaning him out for a certain period of time to Team B.

Team B is on the hook for whatever salary is owed to the player for the remainder of that time period, as well as the pro rated cap hit.

Team A and Team B negotiate a price for the swap, which may include picks, players or even a swap of loans.

At the end of the time period all loaned players, salaries and cap hits return to their original teams. Maybe in certain cases there can be clauses that can make a loan move permanent for the duration of the contract.

Would this work in the NHL? Would it help with teams trying to manage the cap? Would the players be on board?

Look at the KHL, they keep fighting SKA and its schemes to circumvent the cap. There is a loan system in the KHL, and SKA used it a lot to manage its zillion players roster. The same will be in the NHL.

 

[EXTRAS]

Last time I checked football was the number one sport in the world.

Even if you check only countries that have ice hockey, then football is still ahead everywhere except Canada and Finland.

Actually, ice hockey does something wrong if it can't beat football even in winter countries like Russia, Sweden and Norway.

I mean, it's pretty obvious why soccer/futbol is the #1 sport in the world. There is a massive cost of entry for many other sports. Most families in canada can't afford hockey these days.

 

[ItWasJustified]

Would a soccer style loan system work in the NHL?

No and there's no need for it. There's a loan system in European hockey but it's only used for young players that are either too good or too old for the U20 team but needs to play senior hockey, so these kind of players gets loaned to lower leagues. Since the NHL doesn't have promotion/relegation no such system is needed since young players can be sent to the AHL if they're not good enough for the NHL.

 

[Acallabeth]

I mean, it's pretty obvious why soccer/futbol is the #1 sport in the world. There is a massive cost of entry for many other sports. Most families in canada can't afford hockey these days.

There's money in soccer, so I expect it to become unaffordable in NA in a decade too.

On topic: yes, it would work, but it wouldn't be nearly as powerful as in European football leagues.

The concept of loans is feasible because of several conditions:
1) The pool of players, leagues and clubs is vast;
2) Club-affiliated football schools provide a constant influx of young talent;
3) Advanced transfer market with colossal fees for top players;
4) There're no standartized contract limitations (it's possible to sign a 16-yo player for a 7-year , $40M contract).
5) Reserve players can go months or even years without playing, if their direct competition is obviously better.

These conditions eventuate in rich clubs (or clubs with strong academies) preferring to sign players very early to avoid the transfer fees race (or sell them for an astronomical price later) and loan the players who are in their long-term plans to teams who are not their direct competition. Team B then gets a player who can help them with their immediate needs, while Team A gets a player who is more experienced and in a better game shape at the end of the year.

The NHL exists in a relatively isolated universe with a strict system that supports losing teams and limits the power of wealthy clubs or clubs from the hockey-intense areas. So, while there are examples of NHL clubs making deals that don't have the advance of team's results as a primary result (like Horton trade to the Leafs by CBJ), the area with a loan as the best possible option would be very shallow: a stacked team could loan their NHL-ready prospects to below average teams that suffer from mass injuries, but that's about it.

For example, I could potentially see the Caps loaning Miroshnichenko to the Blackhawks for a season (as, simplifying a bit, Washington doesn't have an open roster spot for a scoring winger, Miro is too good for the AHL and the Hawks fans complain about their weak roster all the time), but it would raise other questions: improving their roster would interfere with Chicago tanking, a good NHL season would make Miroshnichenko less cost-controlled, an injury playing for another team would be very unwelcome, and so on.
Or if a team has a star goalie that goes down for nearly all season and very weak backup, so them even making the playoffs is in danger, could use the option to loan a goalie prospect from another conference.

So, while this system could possibly work, overall the NHL just doesn't have the room for it to be very important. And a loan-style deal could be made with basic NHL trade instruments anyway.

 

[jetsforever]

Last time I checked football was the number one sport in the world.

Even if you check only countries that have ice hockey, then football is still ahead everywhere except Canada and Finland.

Actually, ice hockey does something wrong if it can't beat football even in winter countries like Russia, Sweden and Norway.

I mean the reason soccer/football is popular is not because it has a player loan system though

 

[cowboy82nd]

Last time I checked football was the number one sport in the world.

Even if you check only countries that have ice hockey, then football is still ahead everywhere except Canada and Finland.

Actually, ice hockey does something wrong if it can't beat football even in winter countries like Russia, Sweden and Norway.

Wouldn't one of the main reasons for that, is because in soccer you only need a ball to play, therefore you get more people playing because it's cheaper.

 

[OysterForever]

I mean the reason soccer/football is popular is not because it has a player loan system though

Yeah but you may think if sports that big is doing something that hockey isn't?

 

[swissdude]

I think the players would rally against this way more than bettman

not necessarily, there are situations where a team can't find a roster spot for a promising prospect and it would be beneficial for both the player and the team that owns the rights to the player if he could play a season in another team where he would have more ice time without having to be traded away. this can be a win-win situation for both teams involved as well as for the player himself

 

[Hint1k]

To be fair, Soccer/Football is the number one sport in the world because it has the lowest barrier to entry of any sport. You just need a ball for equipment.

Wouldn't one of the main reasons for that, is because in soccer you only need a ball to play, therefore you get more people playing because it's cheaper.

Actually you only need wooden stick and the puck.
It should cost about the same.

 

[Stealth JD]

That would be amazing. Bubble teams like the Blues could send Thomas, Binnington, Kyrou, Parayko and Broberg to contenders for a high price, embrace the tank in the current year and then regroup with all of their players back for next year and try to compete after having security a high draft pick. Sign me up.

 

[GMR]

Can we loan out coaches? If so, I’m all for it.

 

[ijuka]

Why not? In Liiga it's done all the time. A top team loads a young player to a bottom team so that the player can get some ice time and all, while still being the top team's property.

I actually think that the current system in NHL is really bad in comparison. For a player to "get a fresh start" the player needs to be given away and ownership transfered, instead of just... loaning him to another team temporarily. This leads to many players receiving suboptimal development, and is overall bad for the sport. And, frankly, I don't understand why it is this way. I can't see any benefit.

I assume people against this idea have arguments along the lines of "hurr durr change bad."

 

[Rorschach]

No. The chance for injury due to misuse via coaching is too great.

 

[jkrdevil]

It wouldn’t work because teams would prefer to send players down to the minors where they can recall them in case a rash of injuries happen.

 

[jkrdevil]

Yeah but you may think if sports that big is doing something that hockey isn't?

Soccer’s popularity is due to the influence of British trade routes in the late 19th and early 20th century. It has nothing to do with the modern structure of its professional leagues.

 

[beowulf]

This doesn’t really go against the cap though. All cap hits are transferred. The advantage is that it might allow a team to loan a player on a long term deal to a team that only wants to try that player for a shorter period of time because they aren’t sure about how he’ll fit or because their future cap structure won’t allow it.

Not sure if the players would be up for that. This is not Europe, North America is huge and a player might not want to uproot his family from say Montreal to be loaned to Vancouver.

 

[weklof]

That will open up to a extreme tanking. Once a team gives up on a season they'll just rent out their star players. Like what would prevent Montreal from renting out Suzuki and Caufield at the deadline? We will see some horribad teams. In football you have relegation and no draft, so there is no reason to tank. But in the NHL? We'd have 6-7 AHL teams in the end of the season

 

[Fire Sweeney]

These comparisons between different sports are always silly.One major difference is that the european major football leagues absolutely need international players to build a competitive squad. Now some clubs can develop their own talent properly but without the loan system they would be riding the bench so the loans are absolutely necessary. There is nothing comparable in the sport if hockey.

 

[Super Hans]

"Ackshually, it's called 'football'"

 

[HofT]

I can see it where shitty teams want their younger players to gain playoff experience.

 

[Voight]

You'll inevitably have fans complaining when the leagues best teams get to add top players at reduced cap hits while not suffering from any long term commitments.

Imagine everyones favorite team the Golden Knights adding Brady Tkachuk for the playoffs without having to give up a ton of assets because they're just "borrowing" him for a couple months.

 

[Dabeast]

Teams already loan players to their minor league affiliates and occasionally to European teams as well. As others have already said, while there is some in-league loaning in soccer, that wouldn't really apply in the NHL because there's no reason to develop someone else's young players in a rebuild year when you could just see what you have internally (would be the same thing as spending a roster spot on a vet 1 year deal that you can't trade), and with the NHL being a hard cap league, the type of loan where a team wants to just get a player off the wage bill wouldn't really make much sense either.

 

[ManofSteel55]

I think Gary Bettman would explode.

I think the Player's Association would have just as big of an issue with this as Gary would. They don't want players to be uprooted constantly - players want some stability, even if they travel all the time for work. It's nice to have a consistent "home base".

I also don't see how it would work with the cap system in place. There is hardly enough money to go around for UFA's at the deadline, without throwing loans into the mix as well.

 

[Fixed to Ruin]

I think the Player's Association would have just as big of an issue with this as Gary would. They don't want players to be uprooted constantly - players want some stability, even if they travel all the time for work. It's nice to have a consistent "home base".

I also don't see how it would work with the cap system in place. There is hardly enough money to go around for UFA's at the deadline, without throwing loans into the mix as well.

Exactly. The players and the owners are partners in the profits of the league. That's why there can't be money outside of the system.

 

[Kaiden Ghoul]

Nah i would not want the player risking a career ending injury while playing for another team