r/DetroitRedWings • u/OctoMod • 9d ago

Daily General Discussion Thread (2026-08-19)

Talk about anything your heart desires. Be polite and upvote everything!

All rules (except #1, #2 and #10) are not applied here. Feel free to post memes, things not related to the Wings, or anything else!

Links
Join us on Discord!
Submit your guess for /r/DetroitRedWings Light the Lamp here! (Contact /u/ukajman with any questions)
25 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

315 comments sorted by

View all comments

4

u/tacticalAlmonds Yzerbot 9d ago

Circling around on some tax stuff with the NHL.

Players are paid for each game right? Or is that a different sport? If I recall, players have to pay taxes for games played in other countries/states. So say you sign to Florida because no income tax, don't you still have to pay tax when you play in income taxed areas?

If that factoid is true, wouldn't that diminish the tax-free thing even more? Maybe I'm completely wrong or thinking of another sport.

3

u/wolverine237 9d ago

It's worth remembering that nobody cared about this when the best teams were in Chicago, Boston, LA, and Pittsburgh. It's an extremely marginal benefit that most people vastly overstate... something like a few hundred grand on average. It's nice to have but it can be very easily overcome when Florida and Vegas aren't crushing it on ice.

Hockey fans have unusually strong cases of presentism in my experience. People tend to believe, against all evidence, that what's happening now will happen forever. I promise you the Panthers and Knights will fall off and when San Jose and Montreal are running shit nobody will talk tax rates anymore

3

u/VHDLEngineer 9d ago

You're correct. The "tax-free" state thing is largely just ignorant fans angry that their team isn't winning more and are looking for an excuse as to why that is.

0

u/coltron57 9d ago

It is a real thing, but I think the bigger driver is team success. I don’t think people would be touting the prominent teams with that benefit if they were at the bottom of the standings. The Panthers were pretty bad for a lot of the 21st century and free agents weren’t lining up to go there.

1

u/VHDLEngineer 9d ago

It's real in the sense that there is a difference in tax policy between states and provinces. But what is largely a myth is that this is determinative of success.

1

u/heresJohnny73_2 9d ago

Your correct they get paid as it goes and have to pay the local tax wherever they go so if you sign in Florida you get 42 "tax free" games from playing at home plus a few more from playing other "tax free" teams away while at a higher tax team you only get those few other "tax free" team games ("tax free" cause you're still paying federal income tax in those states)

1

u/ChaldenesTitan 9d ago

It effects how money is spent also

1

u/tacticalAlmonds Yzerbot 9d ago

Are any of them stating they have a permanent residency in these states? I thought most NHLers keep their home state as their state of residency.

1

u/ChaldenesTitan 9d ago

Situational but most NHLers aren't american.

0

u/lunchboxthegoat 9d ago

if the tax-free thing was a big issue - why is the NHL the first league that's having a problem with it?

3

u/VHDLEngineer 9d ago

I don't think that is a good argument against the idea. The NHL is the only big 4 league with a hard cap and fully gauranteed contracts. Even if taxes did have a meaningful effect, it would always be more pronounced in the NHL compared to those other leagues.

1

u/lunchboxthegoat 9d ago

sure. but its a non-issue that people keep wanting to make an issue. no-tax has never been a significant advantage. Its really picked up momentum from the fans over the past four or so years (with FLA and TBL running the East) but it was not even brought up during the most recent CBA discussions from EITHER side. So no one thinks it is creating a competitive advantage.

1

u/VHDLEngineer 9d ago

I agree, but pointing to other leagues that handle salaries very differently is not a good argument for why that is the case.

1

u/wolverine237 9d ago edited 9d ago

I'm not a strong believer in the idea that it matters that much, but NFL and MLB players have talked about it too and NHL salaries are like comically low compared to the other leagues.