Russia Starting to Stack Up

Jaromir Jagr is leaving the Czech league to play in Russia.

My Kladno fans should not be angry. I never promised to stay here the whole season

While quotes like this from Jagr aren’t necessarily shocking, no one would mistake him for a play-for-his-hometown-for-almost-nothing-while-making-sure-no-one-lost-a-job-Scott Gomez, something like this does make you wonder if any other players in Europe could follow Jagr’s lead.  Russia is paying big money compared to most other leagues and Alex Kovalev was the latest NHLer to join AK Bars Kazan today.  Kazan is stacked with NHL players including Kovalchuk and Lecavalier.

If just a couple of other teams want to load up to compete, and with bigger money over there, Russia may have the league to watch.

The long-term question is: can the Russian league keep up the big payouts?  If so, it could definitely put a damper on a low-figure hard cap if the NHL wants to retain the world’s top talent.

Posted by David M Singer on Nov 08, 2004 at 01:11 PM

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