Tarasenko and Retained Salary – CBA Confusion Explained

#There’s some misinformation out there so I figured I’d write up an explainer on CBA nuances.

People are currently claiming:
`“Ottawa can’t trade Tarasenko to us with retention, there is a clause in the CBA preventing it!”`

`Article 50.5(e)(iii)(C)(4) on page 273 of the CBA states:`
>*“Under no circumstances may a Club … Reacquire as part of a Retained Salary Transaction the SPC of a Player who was on that Club’s Reserve List within the past calendar year;”*

>*“Illustration: If Club A Trades the SPC of a Player to Club B (the “Initial Trade”), Club B cannot subsequently Trade an SPC of such Player back to Club A within one (1) calendar year from the date of the Initial Trade and retain a portion of the Averaged Amount of that SPC pursuant to a Retained Salary Transaction. However, Club B may Trade an SPC of the Player back to Club A within one (1) calendar year from the date of the Initial Trade if Club B does not retain any portion of such Player’s SPC.”*

Let’s first establish a few things – [the CBA \(collective bargaining agreement\) is a legal document established by the NHLPA and NHL “to set out the terms and conditions of employment for all professional hockey players playing in the National Hockey League, as well as the respective right of the NHL Clubs, the NHL, and the NHLPA.”](https://www.nhlpa.com/the-pa/cba)

As such every single word choice in this document needs to be considered carefully, and it needs to be read with a legal mind.

**There are two major nuances here that should be recognized:**

`”1) SPC (Standard Player Contract) of a player”`

>* The first thing that’s important to note is that all trades in the NHL **are specifically referring to the trading of CONTRACTS, not players.** This is an important distinction as contracts can expire and retained salary transactions are specifically tied to contracts (not the players themselves). The CBA text here specifically emphasizes that a club cannot “reacquire as part of a retained salary transaction the SPC of a player who was on that Club’s Reserve List within the past calendar year.”

>* **So the CBA here is not referring to the player specifically, it is instead referring to reacquiring a contract of a player. The intent of the clause is clearly trying to prevent cap circumvention through trading of contracts between two teams.**

`2) “Reacquire”`

>* Here is where the second important thing to note comes into play. The CBA text here **explicitly states “REACQUIRE.”** This distinction is important, as the term “reacquire” read in this legal context indicates that a club must already have previously possessed the Standard Player Contract in question.

>* This is exactly why Ottawa can retain on Tarasenko to us. Tarasenko’s previous SPC acquired from the Blues had expired. Tarasenko walked as a UFA – his SPC ended, and he signed an entirely new SPC with the Senators.

>* **We would not be “reacquiring” the SPC as we never had ownership of it. It is an entirely new SPC that we would be trading for – we would be acquiring it for the first time.**

`“But what about the NHL blocking the Tony DeAngelo trade between the Flyers and the Canes?”`
`”Isn’t this similar? Tony DeAngelo was on an entirely new signed player contract with the Flyers?”`

>The big difference here is that Tony DeAngelo’s signing rights **were previously traded from the Canes to the Flyers on July 8, 2022.** Because of this initial trade, when the Flyers wanted to trade the last year of Deangelo’s contract to the Canes, the NHL thought there was cap circumvention going on and blocked the trade. ~~Even though it was a new contract(and technically per the legal text of the CBA could also have been allowed), the NHL deemed that the intent of the CBA clause was being violated due to the original trade.~~ EDIT: I had missed that the CBA actually includes RFA rights – which was something that the Canes/Flyers GMs overlooked.

`Compare this to our situation:`

>1) STL trades Tarasenko’s SPC to us.

>2) STL SPC expires as Tarasenko goes UFA.

>3) Tarasenko explores UFA market and signs new SPC with Senators.

>4) Senators trade new Tarasenko SPC to us with retention (?)

You can see how different his scenario is from the DeAngelo example. There was no initial trade from the Rangers here and we are not “reacquiring” an SPC that we had previously. We are instead acquiring a new one that Tarasenko signed with Ottawa. The NHL should have 0 reason to block this trade.

Hope this helps clarify some convoluted CBA nonsense for people and that it was helpful for learning a bit of the weird legal intricacies that go on in the league.

#TLDR:
#Ottawa can retain on Tarasenko to trade to us.
#TDA is a different situation and was blocked because Canes traded his rights to Flyers first.

by ShouniAishaKuma