ZURICH, Switzerland — The National Hockey League will no longer pay transfer fees for European free agents.
The new policy comes after the player transfer agreement between the NHL and the International Ice Hockey Federation expired Sunday after more than a decade of guiding the movement of players between Europe and the NHL.
Without an agreement with non-North American affiliates of the IIHF, the NHL will no longer pay a $200,000 transfer fee to sign players who were not under contract.
The change could save NHL teams a combined total of about $11 million a year to sign between 50 and 60 young players from six European leagues affiliated to the IIHF.
“We’re obviously going a different direction than we have in the past,” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly told The Canadian Press via e-mail. “But our clubs have been prepared for this eventuality for some time.
“There are still some question marks we have to work out with the Players’ Association on where we go from here. But to this point, it appears as if we and the Players’ Association are on the same page vis-a-vis how we need to be dealing with the IIHF and the individual member federations,” he said.
The NHL and six major European members of the IIHF each exercised their right to end the deal in December, one year into a new four-year contract. Russia had pulled out of the system three years ago.
The Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, Sweden, Slovakia and Switzerland were hoping to receive bigger fees for out-of-contract transfers because the American dollar has lost 32 percent of its value since 2002.
“The IIHF tried to convince the European leagues and their clubs that an agreement is better than a situation where basically nothing is regulated,” IIHF president Rene Fasel said in an e-mail statement. “U.S. $200,000 is more than zero dollars. And this is what the clubs are getting now for players who sign NHL contracts.”
The clubs also worried that the quality of domestic leagues has been hurt by NHL teams luring away too many young players, who were then sent to the minor leagues to develop their game.
The old agreement also obliged NHL teams to return certain players to their European club if they did not occupy a regular roster spot, and entitled European clubs to compensation when former players later joined the NHL having left to sign for a Canadian junior club.
“All those things are gone now,” Fasel said.
PANTHERS: Peter DeBoer signed a multiyear contract as Florida’s new coach.
The club hopes DeBoer, a highly touted junior coach from the Ontario Hockey League’s Kitchener Rangers, will offer a fresh start.
DeBoer, 40, has no previous NHL coaching experience, but might already have a few allies on Florida’s bench. He will lead a club whose stars include two of his former players — center Stephen Weiss and forward Gregory Campbell.
PREDATORS: Nashville is determined to keep as many of their young, talented players off the free agent market as possible, and Ryan Suter was the latest to benefit. The team’s first-round pick in the 2003 NHL draft signed a four-year, $14 million deal.
OBIT: Ray Getliffe, the hard-hitting forward credited with giving Canadiens teammate Maurice Richard the nickname “The Rocket,” has died. He was 94 and the second-oldest living former NHL player.
Getliffe was about four months younger than Clint Smith, who played for the New York Rangers and Chicago Blackhawks.
Getliffe played 10 seasons with the Boston Bruins and Montreal Canadiens from 1935-45. He died Sunday in London, Ontario, his son told The Canadian Press.
John Getliffe said his father felt he was fortunate to play the game for a decade.
“He enjoyed it all, it was a great experience and he always said if he had to do it all again, he’d do exactly the same thing,” he said.
A native of Galt, Ontario, Ray Getliffe retired at 31 with 136 goals and 250 points in 393 games. He won a Stanley Cup with the Bruins in 1939 and again with Montreal in 1944.
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