Are current expansion rules too beneficial?

[The Red Helmet]

They do have the option of not signing bad-mediocre players to stupid contracts.

Any team that's capped out only has themselves to blame. If a club is crying about a team that had the opportunity to select from the NHL's cast-offs is better than them, the GM should probably just resign.


Why should an expansion team be dreadful? Why aren't they allowed to be competitive off the bat?

Also hardly anyone believed Seattle and Vegas would actually be good at the time of their drafts (except I did actually). Most teams, and fans, thought the expansion rules were not conducive to building a contender. If the NHL's other 30 clubs were letting go of top-end players outside of their protection lists, that's their own fault for being dumb.

Go back and read what I said. Their is a big gap between being a cup contender and being dreadful, The last two expansion teams have both been cup contenders in their second season. There is not a single bottom feeder that could contend for a in two years time.

Every team that has even been able to contend for a cup for decades has had to build their teams over a period of many years with smart drafting and trades. Not a single team was able to build a consistent cup contender without years of investment.

Now you have expansion drafts where the these teams come out with some of the deepest rosters in the NHL from top to bottom. It's just ridiculous. It diminishes the value of winning The Cup. You don't have to work for it or make shrewd moves, you just pay $500 million and we'll give you a roster that is good enough to be in contention year after year.

 

[bossram]

Go back and read what I said. Their is a big gap between being a cup contender and being dreadful, The last two expansion teams have both been cup contenders in their second season. There is not a single bottom feeder that could contend for a in two years time.

Every team that has even been able to contend for a cup for decades has had to build their teams over a period of many years with smart drafting and trades. Not a single team was able to build a consistent cup contender without years of investment.

Now you have expansion drafts where the these teams come out with some of the deepest rosters in the NHL from top to bottom. It's just ridiculous. It diminishes the value of winning The Cup. You don't have to work for it or make shrewd moves, you just pay $500 million and we'll give you a roster that is good enough to be in contention year after year.

This doesn't hold mustard. No one thought they would be contenders at the time of the draft. No one thought they would be good (I did though). No one thought the expansion draft rules were that favourable to building a contender. And the intent of the expansion rules wasn't to build an elite team.

The only reason Vegas and Seattle became contenders quickly is because of the incredible stupidity of the 30 other GMs and their gross misevaluations of the players on their roster. Dale Tallon gifted Vegas two 1st line players because he wanted protect replacement level defensemen. Toronto could've kept soon-to-be 40 goal scorer Jared McCann, but decided they needed to protect Justin Holl. Any "analytics" guy would've told STL to keep Vince Dunn around.

Vegas and Seattle didn't end up with those guys because the expansion rules were set up to hand them a contender. They ended up with those players because their teams made incredibly bad decisions and didn't know how to evaluate the players they had.

On the point of having to suffer through a lengthy rebuild to build a contender...I don't really care. That's the cycle of sports. Vegas will have to rebuild at some point. And yes, their owner paid a $500M expansion fee, maybe he should be entitled to at least a competitive roster.

 

[DingDongCharlie]

Absolutely not. People were laughing at the team Seattle built

This. People have terrible memories on here. We were all ripping on Francis. He was gifted some solid players as mentioned above Adam Larsson cause Holland was a fool and traded for Keith, had to use a protection spot on him and was forced to hold off on negotiations with Larsson. Larsson was still upset over losing his dad while he was visiting Edmonton and took the opportunity to move on to a fresh start.

 

[Price is Wright]

This doesn't hold mustard. No one thought they would be contenders at the time of the draft. No one thought they would be good (I did though). No one thought the expansion draft rules were that favourable to building a contender. And the intent of the expansion rules wasn't to build an elite team.

The only reason Vegas and Seattle became contenders quickly is because of the incredible stupidity of the 30 other GMs and their gross misevaluations of the players on their roster. Dale Tallon gifted Vegas two 1st line players because he wanted protect replacement level defensemen. Toronto could've kept soon-to-be 40 goal scorer Jared McCann, but decided they needed to protect Justin Holl. Any "analytics" guy would've told STL to keep Vince Dunn around.

Vegas and Seattle didn't end up with those guys because the expansion rules were set up to hand them a contender. They ended up with those players because their teams made incredibly bad decisions and didn't know how to evaluate the players they had.

On the point of having to suffer through a lengthy rebuild to build a contender...I don't really care. That's the cycle of sports. Vegas will have to rebuild at some point. And yes, their owner paid a $500M expansion fee, maybe he should be entitled to at least a competitive roster.

It's absolutely amazing that the Leafs could have protected McCann and Kerfoot in a 7-3-1 but because Dubas and Keefe loved Holl too much they protected 8 skaters instead. One of the dumbest moves Dubas ever made.

 

[Adam da bomb]

Jets did alright with Seattle draft just paying a 3rd to get back our third liner. There will always be competitive disadvantages. Most players don’t want to play in Canada. No one wants to play in Wpg even before dressing room became toxic or they had a chance to be losers.

 

[El Travo]

No. They're fine. If anything, the expansion rules in the past were too harsh.

The best hockey league in the world needs to have good quality hockey, not a bunch of garbage. If an expansion team being moderately successful upsets you, then you really don't appreciate the sport.

 

[coolboarder]

Starting with 100% of your cap space is a massive advantage, independent of any exact expansion rules. 30 other teams were dealing with years of poor decisions that influenced who was and was not being protected, both in terms of raw dollars and also things like NMCs. Seattle and Vegas didn't need to care about any of that outside of reaching the cap floor.

Yes, i agree. I feel that the NHL should raise the protection from 11 including Goaltender to 15, including goaltender. And allow for uncapped year for all remaining teams as they sort out and must be under cap within 2 years without losing their players or at least allow them to get their contract off the book without being tighten by the cap which allowed expansion team to hijack or weaponize the cap space for leverage. I think that expansion shouldn't be using the cap to weaponize so therefore on next expansion, uncapped for all 32 teams for 2 years and expansion team will only be hit by cap since they are starting fresh and must be under cap of previous season.

 

[PettersonHughes]

Don't NMCs factor in as being automatically protected? Good for teams with their best guys on NMC (as they often are), but potentially bad for teams with aging players. Of course, they signed those themselves, and that's kind of balanced out by the 1st and 2nd year pros.

Personally, I might make a minor adjustment like 7/4/1. Not only does that likely protect the top-4, 12 is also a neater number than 11. You might argue that it leaves only breadcrumbs on D, but--factoring in everything--I think you'd still get some good players with potential, and you still have the weaponized cap space to make moves.

Forgot about the 1st and 2nd year pros; on well managed teams like Colorado you can absolutely stash away your ELC guys, protect the ones who meet that eligibility and then dangle any who might unfortunately meet that criteria who get exposed, so I think the 7/3/1 + 1 and 2 year pros is sufficient.

Good point about NMCs, it's a blessing or a curse depending on how the contract is playing out (unfortunately for my team in 2017, Loui Eriksson was an automatic protect), but for bad teams lacking depth or well managed teams (as stated above) I think 7/3/1 already leaves the picking team with very few options (we dangled Sbisa who was a physical but turnover prone D-man to Vegas, or a Ryan Miller in his late 30s).

 

[Voight]

The salary cap is a benefit on its own. CBJ/NSH/MIN etc didn't have that advantage 20/25 years ago.

It's kind of remarkable, when you think about it, but the Leafs have actually managed to *twice* surrender a 40-goal scorer for absolutely nothing during Expansion.

In 1992, the Tampa Bay Lightning claimed Brian Bradley from the Toronto Maple Leafs. Bradley led the Bolts in scoring with 42-goals and 86 points during their inaugural season.

Then the Leafs of course gave up Jared McCann and he just scored 40-goals for the Kraken this year. McCann's 70 points this year saw him lead the team in scoring.

Shocker!!!!! Player does well when he gets a bigger role on a. team with minimal talent.

 

[westc2]

Look at where Seattle's top players have come from, and you'll get your answer.

Dunn: the Blues managed to not only lose Pietrangelo for nothing by signing Faulk to an enormous contract before AP became UFA, but they also protected Faulk over Dunn, promptly losing the better defenseman for nothing. Not a single modicum of foresight was used there.

I think Blues management thought Seattle would select Tarasenko in the draft, who went on to have a career year and lead the Blues in points after not being selected. So either way, Seattle was getting a great player from St. Louis.

Also 6.5 mil cap hit isn't "enormous", especially when you consider Faulk is now our #1 dman. I always really wanted to keep Dunn over Krug though. I think the Krug signing was the biggest recent screw up.

 

[FerrisRox]

Shocker!!!!! Player does well when he gets a bigger role on a. team with minimal talent.

That must be why so many teams have given away multiple 40-goal scorers in Expansion Drafts.

 

[lwvs84]

The draft rules do hurt deep teams a lot more than the old rules used to, but that cap space is so valuable. A compromise might be to have them get a guaranteed #1 pick, teams can release a list of players that they are willing to make available (probably just cap dumps), then the new franchise gets to go FA shopping with a blank payroll. The #1 pick is most likely a better anyone available through the current rules and teams with plenty of depth aren't punished. There might still be good players teams are willing to leave "exposed" because the player isn't working out for their team.

 

[blankall]

Nah...The rules are great the way they are.

What we're seeing is a change in what it takes to win. There was time when you could not win without a true franchise player, you'd drafted #1 overall. You also needed a few other top 4 picks.

Now the draft rules have changed, so tanks aren't as effective.

I'd also state that today's superstars just seem different than the previous ones. They aren't as good as motivating their teams, and they seem more interested in personal glory, fashion, where they live, etc..How many superstars are refusing to play anywhere but NYC, their hometown, in nice weather, etc...The players also don't seem to get that if you are commanding 1/7th of the team's cap space, you are expected to lead the team to victory, potentially at the cost of your own stats.

The success of Vegas and Seattle isn't even really coming from the expansion draft. It's solid asset management, which is making these teams successful. Vegas has made a bunch of big trades and managed their assets well.

I welcome the changes. Build a great team, make great trades, manage assets well, bring in character guys, etc... So much better than the days of tank and get a superstar.

 

[Craigo85]

I would like to see how the next expansion team does when there hasn't been a flat cap for years. Keep the rules the same for one more expansion and see how the next one does.

 

[abo9]

The first reply says it all. I wanted to add, think about the number of fleecings happening around the league every year (small or big). We usually see quite a few, bit trades are not that common.

With an expansion team, all 30 (32?) teams were involved in the process, it forces a flurry of moves and decisions. A bunch of GMs will make the correct ones, a bunch will make questionable decisions, and a few will blunder badly. Well, an expa sion team benefitting from 5 blunders would be really happy no?

In any case, I think it makes sense for them to be good right out the gate. The NHL goes there to capture a new market... and what better to get more people interested than having them witness exciting seasons?

Plus at this point Vegas really revamped their roster compared to their first year.