NHL Accelerates Changes to Collective Bargaining Agreement for the 2025-26 Season
The NHL and NHLPA have agreed to streamline the implementation of a salary cap for the playoffs and modifications to the long-term injury reserve rules for the 2025-26 season. These modifications are part of the league’s new Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), which will come into effect ahead of schedule. The current CBA agreement ends on September 15, 2026. The new agreement, announced in July, has a duration of four years. NHL general managers will be briefed on CBA rules for this season at their meetings in Detroit this week. Salary cap rules for the playoffs address an ongoing concern for some players and general managers: teams using long-term injury reserve (LTIR) rules to field rosters that would have exceeded the regular season salary cap ceiling. Previously, there was no salary cap in the Stanley Cup playoffs, which allowed teams to bring back players who were on LTIR at the end of the regular season for Game 1 of the playoffs after having used their available space on the salary cap to add more talent at the trade deadline.The salary cap compliance only applies to players participating in a given postseason game. According to an NHL player agent: “You can have $130 million in salaries on your total roster once the playoffs begin, but the 18 players and two goalies on the ice must comply with the cap.” At 3 p.m., local time, or five hours before a playoff game, whichever comes first, teams will submit a roster of 18 players and two goalies to the NHL Central Registry. A “playoff roster club average salary” will be calculated for that roster, which must be below the team’s salary cap “upper limit.” The “club average salary” is the sum of the player’s salary and bonus face value amounts averaged for that season for each player on the roster, and all amounts charged to the team’s salary cap. Along with that postseason salary cap, the NHL and NHLPA have agreed to accelerate changes to the long-term injury reserve rules for the 2025-26 season. The total salary and bonuses for “a player or players” who have replaced a player on LTIR cannot exceed the amount of the total salary and bonuses of the player they are replacing. The new LTIR rule also states that “the average amounts of such replacement players cannot exceed the league’s average salary from the previous season.” There is an exception to the changes in the LTIR rule: teams can exceed these “average amounts”, but the injured player would not be eligible to return that season or in the postseason. That exception needs approval from both the NHL and the NHLPA. Other CBA changes that are being accelerated for the 2025-26 season: The prohibition of deferred compensation in player contracts, which will take effect on October 7. The rest of the CBA changes will have a “gradual implementation” over the next year, including an increase in the minimum salary for players next March. Other significant rule changes, such as the variation in contract value and term limits in the contract, will not take effect until after the entire CBA comes into effect on September 16, 2026. The NHL’s shift to an 84-game regular season will also be implemented in 2026-27.“I think overall it’s a good thing because it’s a competitive advantage. That’s how most people see it, especially if you can use it the right way,” commented Nazem Kadri, center for the Calgary Flames.
Nazem Kadri
