The NHL season so far is reminiscent of the Breeders Cup, except we can guarantee that there will be no Breeders Cup-type scandal over a possible inside-chicanery, winning Pick Six wager on the division winners.

	Darius Kasparaitis' $4.1 million pricetag may make other teams think twice when shopping for free agents.

These are real races.

Puck parity, in other words.

As of this writing -- nine days before Christmas, or eight days before the shopping season begins for the astute -- the Stars' eight-point lead in the Pacific is the only division margin approaching double-digits.

And in the conference races, Boston's five-point and Dallas' two-point lead are far from insurmountable.

So what's the reason for all of this?

There isn't one.

There is more than one.

1. The salary cap is taking hold.

Wait, you say there isn't a salary cap in the NHL? Isn't that what the looming 2004 collective bargaining agreement war is going to involve?

Of course there is a salary cap in the NHL -- and, despite what some Chicago hockey fans think, not just in Wirtzdom.

The NHL's salary cap is unofficial, yet very real.

It isn't a case of owners and general managers sitting around and coming up with a system and a ceiling figure, and then concocting 342 ways to get around both, as is the case in the NBA. Nor do the NHL men have the luxury of being able to jettison players not delivering the bang for the buck, as is the case in the NFL, where contracts aren't guaranteed.

Plus, the evidence has mounted that blank-check approaches don't work in this sport. See: Rangers.

And, conversely, that restraint, coupled with savvy, can produce at the very least a competitive team ... in the regular season. See: Bruins, Canucks, Oilers and even the Devils.

The Bruins' major aggressive move -- the signing of Martin Lapointe, which apparently was a one-finger response to the Wings' belittling of Boston's penury -- has been proven to be virtually superfluous, so the "restrained" approach might become even more pronounced.

Again, this is why the NHL is hypocritical if it digs in when the bargaining gets dirty and demands a hard salary cap. There is nothing to prevent owners and general managers from exercising restraint in a free-enterprise system, and the NHL's existing system of free agency -- unrestricted only after age 31 under most circumstances -- already is the most sensible and fair in all of sport.

2. Up to a point, parity means collective mediocrity.

This ties into the above, and it must be considered a given that all these issues are interrelated.

The elite teams -- Detroit and especially Colorado -- have come back to the pack.

Colorado has been conscious of paying a "core" of superstars big money, but cutting and "layering" the roster beyond that elite tier. And that's a delicate balance: Now that Colorado's pool of lower-priced prospects and role players has thinned out through trades and other attrition, the Avalanche have come back to the pack, so to speak.

And even with all those future Hall of Famers on the roster, the Red Wings haven't operated as if Mike Ilitch has sold a pizza to every man, woman and child in North America in the past 24 hours, either.

	Dwayne Roloson, who earns $600,000, is 5-0-3 in his last eight games.

With 39 points in 30 games, which puts them on a 104-point pace, despite the absence of Steve Yzerman, it's not as if the Wings are falling apart. But they also look vulnerable this time around.

3. The recent wave of expansion franchises, in general, has become competitive.

Yes, this is relative in the sense that if everyone in the conference beat up on the weak franchises, whether expansion or otherwise, that doesn't have much of an effect on the top of the standings. But even the bad teams are capable enough now to be able to beat the best, on an across-the-board basis, and not allow one team to "own" them.

The Minnesota Wild have become one of the West's powers. While the Wild fanatics who believe the Twin Cities mayors already should be planning and fighting over the parade routes are premature, by now those of us who considered Minnesota's start to be illusionary have been proven wr ... wr ... wrong.

Even after horrible starts, the Predators and Thrashers are competitive. And if Byron Dafoe can get it turned around and stop playing as if he did nothing but sit on a Bali beach during his exile from the league, Atlanta has enough young talent to become either a spoiler or an issue in the playoff race.

4. Few real losers in overtime.

The guaranteed point for overtime means that even an overtime loser in an intraconference game only loses one point of ground in the standings. The NHL traditional mentality has prevented a universal acceptance of the reality -- in many cases, going all-out for the win in overtime has no downside -- but the extra point in so many games has helped compact the standings.

5. It's still early.

It's a long time, in other words, before Dave Johnson yells: "And down the stretch they come!"

Terry Frei is a regular contributor to ESPN.com. His book, "Horns, Hogs, and Nixon Coming," was issued Dec. 2 by Simon and Schuster.