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The $12 million gap?Tuesday, February 15, 2005Despite some reported major moves by both sides Monday night, the NHL and NHLPA were not able to reach an agreement to settle the lockout. According to the NHLPA the two sides did, however, finally reach some common ground in their proposals and it all boiled down to a $12 million gap. But Dallas Stars owner Tom Hicks thinks the reports of progress may have been overstated. The NHLPA released a statement early Tuesday that described events this way: The NHL's Bill Daly made the first offer during a meeting in Niagara Falls, NY, proposing a system that would entail a $40 million salary cap that would not include linkage. In other words, there would be no fixed link between overall league player compensation costs and league revenues. That was a major concession on the league's part. The NHLPA's Ted Saskin countered with a proposed "upper payroll limit" at $52 million along with more aggressive payroll tax thresholds and stiffer tax rates on team payrolls. The accepting of what appears to be a capped based system was a huge move by the players, who said they would never accept a cap. But it wasn't enough for the league, who rejected the offer according to the NHLPA. "It is indeed unfortunate that with the major steps taken by both sides today we were unable to build enough momentum to reach an agreement," Saskin said in a statement early Tuesday. Hicks was asked about the reports of last night's meeting during a radio interview with radio station KTCK 1310 The Ticket Tuesday morning. "Well, I talked to the commissioner [Gary Bettman] late last night and I think the reports of progress were apparently a little bit overstated. It does not look good at this time," Hicks said. "I said the other day -- I mean it -- I think the players unfortunately have turned down the best offer they are going to be presented. We'll just see where it goes from here." Later in the interview Hicks was asked again about the players' reported concession on the cap. His response: "They really haven't. So much of this has been PR going back and forth between the Bob Goodenow and the league. I've talked to the commissioner every day for the last three weeks. I know what has been offered and a lot of this is just media spinning by the union. "The fundamental issue is do you have any kind of relationship of total payroll to revenues. I call that a partnership. At this point they refuse to enter into any kind of arrangement that would have salaries tied to revenues of the league."
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