Would a soccer style loan system work in the NHL?

[Gregor Samsa]

Aren’t they between different leagues? Not sure how it would work in the NHL and what purpose it would serve

 

[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