Negotiations
The two parties exchanged a pair of offers as the deadline for a lockout approached. The union's last offer before the expiry of the collective bargaining agreement continued to call for an unlinked salary cap that would steadily increase over a five-year term. Donald Fehr argued that if the league continued to see revenue increase at the seven percent average of the 2005–2012 CBA, the players' share of revenues would drop from the 57 percent they received in 2011–12 to a low of 52 percent in 2015–16, but increase in the final two years of the deal back to 54 percent. The NHL countered with a time-limited offer where it would continue with the existing definition of hockey-related revenue and a linked salary cap that would pay the players 49 percent of revenues in 2012–13 and fall to 47 percent by the sixth year of the deal.[5] Each side rejected the others' offer, and some veteran players expressed willingness to sit out an entire season if necessary.[6] The National Hockey League officially locked its players out when the CBA expired,[7] and on September 19, cancelled all preseason games for the month of September.[8] Several players then signed contracts to play in European leagues for the duration of the dispute.[9]
The NHLPA challenged the NHL's right to lock out the players in two Canadian jurisdictions. Sixteen members of the Montreal Canadiens unsuccessfully sought a temporary injunction from the Quebec labor Relations Board that would prevent the team from locking its players out of practice facilities and would have required the Canadiens to pay its players regardless.[10] Twenty-one members of the Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers sought similar relief from the Alberta labor Relations Board, but the board ruled in favour of the NHL.[11]
Having cancelled the remainder of the preseason, and regular season games up to November 1,[12][13] on October 16, Bettman offered a 50–50 revenue split in the owners' latest CBA proposal. Two days later, the Players' Association presented three counterproposals. Both sides were still far apart when negotiations ended.[14] The league, which refused to negotiate with the NHLPA unless they used the league proposal as the starting point, withdrew its offer after negotiations failed.[15][16] Subsequently, on October 26, the NHL cancelled all games scheduled for November,[17] including the annual Hall of Fame game, scheduled for November 9 at the Air Canada Centre, and the Black Friday Thanksgiving Showdown scheduled to air on NBC.[18]
The league and players' association resumed negotiations on November 6, meeting over six consecutive days in a neutral, undisclosed location.[20] The NHL offered to pay a $211 million "make whole provision" over the first two years of the deal to honour existing player contracts; the NHLPA sought $590 million.[21] On November 21, the NHLPA made a new proposal that left the sides $182 million apart, which Bettman immediately rejected.[22] Two days later, all games up to December 14 were cancelled, as well as the All-Star Game.[23]
The NHL and NHLPA agreed to mediation under the auspices of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service on November 26.[24] The sides met with mediators on November 28 and 29, but the mediators quit after that point, determining they could not make any progress reconciling the two parties' demands.[25]
Following mediation, Bettman proposed a meeting between players and team owners to Donald Fehr, and Jamal Mayers tweeted that the NHLPA had made a similar offer to meet directly with owners.[26] From December 4 to 6, six team owners, 17–19 players, and staff from both sides met to negotiate and exchange proposals. The league offered to raise the "Make Whole" provision to $300 million and to give ground on player contracting and pension issues, but identified three components of the CBA they considered important: a five-year limit on player contracts, a ten-year length of the new CBA, and compliance issues. The players offered an eight-year limit on contracts and an eight-year CBA with an opt-out clause after six years. The NHL rejected the offer, and talks broke down again. After negotiations failed, Bettman delivered a press conference saying the "Make Whole" provision would be pulled off the table. He also stated that the league would deny the union's request to bring mediators back into the negotiations.[27][28] Four days later, the NHL cancelled all games up to December 30.[29]
After talks broke down, rumours leaked that the NHLPA planned on filing a "disclaimer of interest" (a quicker, less formal way to dissolve the players' union, compared with decertification)[30] and, with collective bargaining no longer in effect, pursuing an antitrust lawsuit against the NHL. The NHL responded on December 14 by filing a class action suit with the U.S. District Court in New York seeking to establish that its lockout was legal. Included in the lawsuit was a request for all existing player contracts to be "void and unenforceable", should the NHLPA be dissolved, resulting in all NHL players becoming free agents.[31] The league also filed an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board, stating that the union had been negotiating in bad faith and that its threat to disclaim interest was a negotiating ploy that violated the collective bargaining process.[32][33] In a vote conducted from December 17 to 21, the players authorized the union's executive board to file a disclaimer of interest, up until January 2, 2013, though it did not proceed with the filing.[34] On December 20, the league cancelled all games up to January 14, 2013.[35]
After a Christmas hiatus, the league made another offer to the players on December 27. The offer was reportedly for a ten-year contract with an opt-out clause after eight, and included a US$60 million salary cap taking effect in 2013, a six-year term limit on player contracts (seven years for teams re-signing their own players), an increase in the allowed amount of variance year-to-year in player contracts to ten percent from the originally proposed five, and the make-whole provision remaining the same as the previous offer.[36] The proposal required a minimum 48-game regular season schedule starting no later than January 19[37] which would be preceded by a one-week training camp, thereby requiring an agreement to be reached by January 11.[36] Face-to-face negotiations recommenced shortly thereafter.[38] With the expiry of the NHLPA's authorization to file a disclaimer of interest, the two sides continued to discuss three key issues: player pensions, the salary cap (with the players requesting a US$65 million cap for the second year of the collective bargaining agreement), and contract lengths.[39]
