Daly admits “no progress” was made on Sunday

In the grand scheme of things, NHL exec Bill Daly seemingly backed up NHLPA head Donald Fehr’s assessment of Sunday’s brief meetings, telling ESPN’s Pierre LeBrun that there was “no progress.”

To little surprise, the two sides differ on their outlook regarding the specifics, though.

While Fehr implies that the NHL won’t budge at all – Fehr told Sportsnet’s Michael Grange that the leagues wants players to agree to their deal “to the comma” – Daly indicates to Grange that there’s at least some movement.

Daly said NHL did give on 14 of 17 issues -- things like minimum salaries; play off pool; waiver rules. Not make or break issues tho.

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Michael Grange (@michaelgrange) November 11, 2012

Update: RDS’ Renaud P. Lavoie updated some of the areas that the league reportedly budged on in a series of Tweets.

• Union guarantee of Escrow
• Union discretion to set the Escrow rate
• An increased playoff pool
• Minimum roster requirements
• No-trade clauses in extensions
• Eliminating re-entry waivers
• Adjustments to other waiver rules
• Performance bonus cushions in every year
• Changing the free agent calendar. (Lavoie believes it will no longer fall on July 1.)

Still, the bold points are similar, especially since Daly also admitted to Grange that there is “no real room to move on contract issues.”

(Despite a candid discussion.)

Overall, it appears that the two sides returned to the posturing/spin zone this weekend after keeping outsiders in the dark during some lengthy discussions.

While Fehr and Daly admit that it’s unclear when the two sides will meet again, the impression is that they will – which might give these yo-yo discussions a chance to move in a more optimistic direction once again.

Then again, there’s another negative to consider: we’re already almost halfway through November.