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A Short History of Recent Financial Issues [Reviewed 1/2]


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So it’s good that the announcement of the Helsinki Titans cap violation was made today as I was struggling to find something to write about for my media this week (For those asking about the World Cup articles, I plan on starting them next week, when I should hopefully have the World Cup Tracker completed). So, let’s have a look at the last five cap violations (or at least the ones that I recall) that the VHL has seen.

 

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Season 48 – Helsinki Titans

 

What Happened: Helsinki Titans General Manager William Shaw discovered after 30 regular season games that his team were $1.5 Million over the cap. As a result (or at least as it stands), the Titans will be forced to forfeit their third round selection in Season 49, in addition to Kendrick Cole (who is coincidentally contracted to earn $1.5 Million this season) was relegated to the VHLM. It seems that the incident came about after Shaw was misled by an outdated balance sheet that he would have enough money to trade for Raphael Pettyfer, however this contract sheet still had Aleksi Koponen as a free agent and did not include the contract of Kendrick Cole. While Cole hasn’t accepted the deal (probably the reason why it wasn’t added to the balance sheet), Cole’s inclusion on a roster that was already costing the team $32 Million could not be allowed to continue. Considering that this seems to be just an accident and something that the Titans don’t really gain from anyway (they didn’t need Cole’s help to make the playoffs for example), the light punishment is appropriate, although I’ve always favoured teams that go over the threshold receiving cap penalties the following season and instead use draft pick penalties for those that aren’t making the cap floor, punishments that are more fitting for their crime.

 

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Season 48 – Riga Reign

 

Technically not really an issue, but it’s still a cap related violation. As it stands, the Riga Reign are currently only paying $19 Million, one million less than the cap floor. While a $2.5 Million bonus for Bronson Faux has been posted up, it hasn’t been accepted and, with new regulations saying that bonuses for inactives aren’t allowed, this leads me to believe we are waiting for a signature from Faux to make this bonus official. If Faux weren’t to accept though, it’d be interesting to see whether anything would be enforced on the Reign, and whether their failure to meet the cap floor aids them in getting a more beneficial draft selection.

 

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Season 46 – Seattle Bears

 

This is something that faced no punishment, but I’m very iffy on how it all went down. The Seattle Bears were woeful in Season 46, they were easily the worst team in the league and it was only losing the lottery to Stockholm that stopped them from having a first overall selection in the Season 47 Draft. However, through that season, they had only paid their players a total of $13.5 Million, $6.5 Million dollars below the salary floor. During that season, three bonuses that would have seen the Bears make the floor had been tendered but were not accepted. When it was brought up, the decision was made that the players the bonuses had been offered to were inactive (in fact this should not have been the case, as all three of the players had been present on the board both within a week before and after the bonuses were offered) and considered auto-accepted along with a rule amendment being made the following off-season to say that inactive bonuses would no longer be allowed (even though I’m not even necessarily sure they ever were allowed). It was just curious that this was all happening while people were actively campaigning for Quebec to be punished over “tanking”.

 

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Season 45 – HC Davos Dynamo

 

This was a big thing all over nothing. The contract that Gorlab had originally posted for James Faraday was $5 Million whereas the original offer in the Season 44 thread read $4.5 Million, which lead to Gorlab voicing an argument that Higgins had “stealth edited” his contract. I’d seen Higgins stealth edit updates and player store purchases in the past, so I wasn’t 100% convinced (like most of the members were) that Gorlab had just made a mistake, but  it turned out that there was no evidence of editing and so the contract was changed to $4.5 Million.

 

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Season 45 – Quebec City Meute

 

Couple of problems arose in Season 45 with the Meute, although they were resolved easily enough. The first issue was that they were originally pegged down as paying for Jax Barnstormer, who had retired in the off-season, but it turned out that Kesler had spoken with management about this and he was free to remove him off his roster and subsequently off his salary. However, he decided to offer $1 Million bonuses to both Ariel Weinstein and Francis York Morgan, despite the fact that he only had $1 Million to spend in total. Kesler’s excuse was that he thought the cap was $33 Million for some reason, which is incredible for two reasons. 1) This was his fifth season as a General Manager and 2) it literally says how much cap his team had to spend in font that is literally this size at the top of the first post. You know, I guess I can see why he missed this, it’s not very clear is it?

Fair enough. Hitting the cap floor is ridiculously difficult in a weak FA class. I didn't want to be a team that unfairly gave inactives bonuses/paid inactive FAs 5+ mil so I did what I could. If I get punished for it, so be it. 

Edited by Toast
  • Senior Admin
32 minutes ago, XaviYEAH! Woods said:

although I’ve always favoured teams that go over the threshold receiving cap penalties the following season and instead use draft pick penalties for those that aren’t making the cap floor, punishments that are more fitting for their crime.

 

This makes a lot of sense, I've never thought about it that way.

 

Great article. It's actually quite impressive you were able to put this together in such detail so quickly :P

 

 

1 hour ago, XaviYEAH! Woods said:

 

Technically not really an issue, but it’s still a cap related violation. As it stands, the Riga Reign are currently only paying $19 Million, one million less than the cap floor.

 

Also, gawd dammit. :facepalm:

  • 3 weeks later...

Feedback:

Just going through the older stuff and I suppose this slipped by.

Interesting to see the little problems that teams have had with the cap.

Good write-up, as usual from you.

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