The calendar officially flipped to December on Tuesday and there’s still no start date set in stone for the 2020-21 NHL season.
So what’s the holdup?
Despite the NHL and NHL Players’ Association agreeing to a new six-year CBA in July, the NHL went back to the union and asked the players to defer a larger percent of their salaries for the upcoming season. As you can imagine, the players reportedly felt "angry" and "betrayed" by the league's amendment proposals after the two sides had already agreed on the numbers four months prior.
No progress has been made for weeks now, which is noteworthy considering the target start date all along has been Jan. 1. For comparison purposes, the NBA's start date is slated for Dec. 22 and training camp started on Tuesday.
According to TSN's Pierre LeBrun, one source on the 16-player Return to Play committee believed a start date between Jan. 20 and Feb. 1 makes more sense at this point. But is there a possibility that the season gets canceled altogether?
Under Article 7.1(b) of the CBA, "Neither the League nor any Club shall engage in a lockout during the term of this Agreement." But there have been whispers that the league could seek to invoke the force majeure clause of the Standard Player's Contract due to unforeseen circumstances of the global COVID-19 pandemic, and it was mentioned on Insider Trading as a possibility if the NHLPA legally challenged a canceled season.
The owners probably didn't anticipate that there wouldn't be fans in buildings this season while the players feel that was always a possibility when the agreement was made four months ago.
Neither side wants to cancel the season, but the time is ticking, and it would be wise of the NHL to start earlier than later to give itself wiggle room in case it needs to make up games on the fly, which is what MLB faced this season.
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