[sureLoss]

Led by former Flame Hakan Loob

http://www.thehockeynews.com/blog/eu...fer-agreement/

The three top prospects for this year’s NHL draft all played in Europe this season and they’re all projected to become enormous stars in North American and make millions of dollars over the course of their careers. And if things go as planned, they’ll be a cash cow for their NHL employers, as well.

But what about the teams they’re leaving? In the case of Patrik Laine and Jesse Puljujarvi, the Tappara and Karpat teams in the Finnish League will not only be losing their best players, they’ll also be parting with two young men in whom they’ve invested an huge amount of resources. And once they sign deals with the NHL teams that select them, they’re receive a one-time payment of about $240,000. That’s it. Nothing more. Do not pass Go. Do not collect any more money. And in the case of the Zurich Lions in the Swiss League, they won’t receive a cent.

Well, a meeting of the rather unwieldily named Alliance of European Hockey Clubs (EHC), set for Wednesday in Vienna, wants to see if something can be done about that. With close to 50 European teams already committed to membership, the organization is led by former NHLer Hakan Loob. It’s an organization that thinks the International Ice Hockey Federation and the national federations that represent them have done a poor job of looking out for their interests and they want change.

The meeting Wednesday in Vienna is another baby step in that process. At the meeting, the 10 members of the interim board will meet to discuss the mission of the alliance and confirm the priorities of the group, which will be presented to the full membership at the first annual meeting, which is slated for June 13 in Berlin.

Much of this, of course, centers on money. According to the transfer agreement between the NHL and the European federations, teams receive about $240,000 per player they lose, regardless of whether he’s a future NHL superstar or a fourth-line grinder. The Russian federation, which has opted out of the agreement along with Switzerland, gets nothing when it loses a player. What the alliance wants to do is to come up with a model that replicates soccer, where negotiations for players are done directly between the two teams involved. The way it stands now, if the Toronto Maple Leafs want to sign Russian free agent defenseman Nikita Zaitsev, CSKA Moscow gets nothing.