The Lockout is Over! (Hopefully)

It finally looks like the lockout has come to a close. After a marathon 16 hour negotiation the NHL and the NHLPA have reached a tenative agreement. Well what does this mean?

Right now nothing is official it is just a tenative agreement between the two sides but it still needs to be approved by the Board of Governers. There will be a meeting on wednesday to go over the tenative CBA, but the way things are going it looks like this will be signed and that camp will start sometime this weekend. 

So what took so long? Where did the two sides reach common ground? What did the NHL and NHLPA get out of these negotiations? There are a few things that have changed from the last CBA to this one. 

According to TSN hockey insiders here are the details for the new CBA:

The CBA is 10 years in length but there is a mutual opt out after 8.

Revenue sharing has gone to a 50/50 split for the length of the CBA

The Salary Cap is 64.3 Million.

Each team is allowed two amnesty buyouts after this season and next.

Salary Variance cannot vary more than %35 from year to year and the lowest year cannot go below %50 than the highest year.

Revenue sharing among teams will grow to 200 Million as well as a 60 Million Growth fund initianted by the league. 

So after all of that fighting this is what the league has decided is what they want and the NHLPA has agreed. 

What do you guys think of the lockout? Which side gave up more? Is this a fair compromise for both sides? Are you still excited for hockey this year or did the lockout make you move on to other forms of entertainment? 

All I know is that I am happy hockey is back and that we will have labor peace for at least the next 8 years.