so NHL agent Alan Walsh who is certainly no stranger to making noise on Twitter posted something that I honestly disagree with Allan Walsh is really famously against the NHL salary cap after Leon signed his new deal he posted about how although he's got the highest NHL contract it's still Small Potatoes by NFL MLB and NBA standards when people pointed out that the NHL is a smaller League than those three he responded by comparing the top salaries when they had similar levels of League Revenue so in 23 24 the NHL had revenue of 6.5 billion the top salary of 14 million you can see that even at equal levels the NHL has lower top salaries than the NBA under its soft cap the MLB under the no salary cap in the NFL under its soft cap what Alan Walsh is selectively ignoring and what he always ignores when he brings this point up whether in this context or talking about the lack of inflation for top NHL salaries is that the NHL is simply a more evenly structured League when it comes to salaries yes the NBA had a much higher top salary in 2015 2016 but the overall salary cap was 70 million the NHL's is about to be 88 million looking at the roster sizes across both leagues that puts average salaries for both at around 4 million the NFL is a far more drastic situation in 2005 the NFL had a salary cap of 85 million but that was across a roster of 50 plus players I think 52 rostered players with the NFL also not really using fully guaranteed contracts now these numbers especially the NBA with the luxury tax and the soft cap aren't meant to be exact but we can see that when you look at overall player compensation on average the players are doing pretty well in the NHL what Walsh is advocating for is what we saw in the 9s where teams could pay players like Joe saic $16 million but that really only benefits the super Elites and of course their agents I don't really see any convincing evidence that it's better for the average player as a whole which makes sense because the NBA and the NHL both have very similar Revenue splits for example the NHL when it comes to the ultra high salaries is also just a different sport in how it's designed I mean football is probably the best example of this where there are some players like quarterbacks who will be out for almost every offensive play and who single-handedly carry the fortunes of their team or at least they can lose games for their team alternatively you have players whether special teams only you know backups they're a lot less individually important to their team's success basketball also that's a closer comparison to hockey and there you see individual Superstars or groups of superstars carrying teams in a way that's just not possible in hockey and that is largely due to minutes played Chris Pronger has the average time on ice out of any player in NHL history at 27 minutes per game under half the game McDavid last year came in at 21 minutes so just over a third whereas in the NBA there are over 80 players playing over half the game Kevin Durant played 37 out of 48 minutes last season that's over three times as much floor share as McDavid gets ice share if that makes sense so yeah I just don't think the argument makes sense nor do I think removing the salary cap does anything for fans for one I'll say it bluntly I don't care about the mega contract the top NHL Superstars are getting whether it's 14 million over 8 years or 20 million over 8 years I just don't care I'm a lot more interested in the average welfare of the NHL player and even more interested in how sustainable the game is for those in lesser professional leagues that's no shot against the NHL these guys deserve to be paid they're the best in the world but I also think a salary cap does play a very important role in maintaining parity I talked about some of the insane contracts of the 1990s how certain teams would attempt to buy Stanley Cups but you look at the highest salaries in the league it's always the same few teams the Red Wings the Rangers Colorado and as hockey gets more and more popular these massive teams like the Leafs are just going to be able to outspend average markets I think that's what we get in baseball and I don't think that's very fun but those are my thoughts I'd love to hear yours let me know down below if you enjoyed today's video please drop a like and if you want more content there's a new basketball football and hockey video on screen right now I'll see you soon thanks for watching [Music]