It Never Ends

So yesterday, a small tear was shed about losing Ilya Kovalchuk in the roller coaster courting of free agency...but the saga WILL. NOT. END.

The NHL stepped in and voided the 17-year supercontract between Kovy and New Jersey, citing improprieties in the structure that deliberately created a lower salary cap hit. And why is that important? There's a great explanation by Rich Hammond about how salary and salary cap really factor into deals which clears up a lot, but there's also the glaring tilt in salary - here's how the payout would have been:

2010-11: $6 million
2011-12: $6 million
2012-13: $11.5 million
2013-14: $11.5 million
2014-15: $11.5 million
2015-16: $11.5 million
2016-17: $11.5 million
2017-18: $10.5 million
2018-19: $8.5 million
2019-20: $6.5 million
2020-21: $3.5 million
2021-22: $750,000
2022-23: $550,000
2023-24: $550,000
2024-25: $550,000
2025-26: $550,000
2026-27: $550,000

The contract represents a $6 million annual cap hit for the Devils. There is a no movement clause through the 2016-17 season and a no trade clause from 2018-19 through the deal's completion. Kovalchuk can be traded between July 1, 2017, and June 30, 2018.

Sure, you pay a player more when they're in their prime, but the deal has Kovy on ice when he's 44 years old...and he's no Chris Chelios in terms of stamina or Gordie Howe in longevity.

Kings-centric blog Jewels From The Crown immediately and clairvoyantly questioned the signing, and called for an investigation of the 17-year deal with the Devils:

If (Commissioner) Bettman isn't going to draw the line in the sand here, where is the line? Why not have it be 23 years, until Kovalchuk is 50? Thirty-three years, till he's 60? Obviously, Lamoriello (NJ's GM) has made the calculation and decided that 17 years is the farthest he can push the Bettman without forcing him to void the deal. But Chicago made that calculation on the Hossa deal and decided a deal that took Hossa to age 42 was as far as they could go, and they got themselves an investigation. I know that's meaningless, except to say that the Kovalchuk deal has at least earned itself that much.

And this was the one that broke the dam, as Yahoo! Sports NHL concisely points out here.

So now, The NHL Players Association has five days to file a grievance and the contract would be considered dead until an arbitrator's decision is announced. If there's no response from the NHLPA, then after five days the contract is dead and it's back to the free market. Interestingly, Devils GM Lou Lamoriello openly admitted he was not a fan of the deal and that the NHL "shouldn't have these", and it's worth adding that New Jersey's VP of Hockey Ops, Steve Pellegrini, worked for the NHL as their "cap regulator", meaning that he understands everything there is to know about the collective bargaining agreement - so this should have cleared.

A source "familiar with NHL contracts and the CBA" told ESPN.com that they can't see how the NHL could win its case -- that the deal circumvents the collective bargaining agreement -- if it went to court. What's to stop a team from signing a player to a contract that takes him into his 40s, the source said. There is no language in the CBA to prohibit that, they pointed out. But this may be the crackdown from the league to close the loophole of recent deals tendered to players like Roberto Luongo, Chris Pronger, Marc Savard, Marian Hossa and others preceding Kovalchuk's deal. The result, if it works in the NHL's favor, would limit the length of contracts and solidify language governing the range of payments acceptable within a contract.

If the contract is killed, what happens next? Will teams return to the frenzy now that the league has officially chilled the long-term, front-loaded contract frenzy? And what team will take a run at Kovy knowing he'll want the max dollars allowable ($11.5 million) along with a long term?