NHL Brass Downplays State Income Tax Complaints Across League

If you’ve been on social media during the Stanley Cup playoffs, you’ve probably seen a variety of fans and media personalities complaining about the Florida Panthers having an unfair advantage when it comes to the NHL’s salary cap — the Sunshine State has no income tax.

TNT analyst Paul Bissonette even said on a postgame show that the NHL needs to look into addressing the teams that don’t have to pay state income tax to their players because it’s too much of an advantage in the next CBA.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and deputy commissioner Bill Daly met with members of the media Wednesday at Rogers Place before the puck was dropped in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final between the Panthers and Edmonton Oilers.

Daly admitted some of the league’s franchises have expressed concern about the so-called advantage, but the NHL brass doesn’t “share the level of concern that they have.”

“These imbalances have existed forever,” Daly said during the press conference, per league-provided video. “There’s nothing new here. There are so many reasons why a player may choose to play in a particular location, for a particular team, for a particular coach that have nothing to do with the tax situation in that market.

“So, I don’t think it’s anything we’re going to address proactively as part of this collective bargaining negotiation.”

The argument could be made because the Panthers have represented the Eastern Conference in the last three Stanley Cup Finals, and the Tampa Bay Lightning were in the three Finals before them.

But, if you are going to look at the Florida teams, you also have to look at players that continually signed extensions with their teams in states where income tax is present — like former Boston Bruins legends Zdeno Chara, Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand and Pittsburgh Penguins stars Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang.

They all could have made more money by signing with one of the six teams — Panthers, Lightning, Vegas Golden Knights, Dallas Stars, Nashville Predators and Seattle Kraken. Still, they all stayed loyal to their franchises, and ironically, both clubs continually made the playoffs, season after season.