So each team will have a protected list of players that the Golden Knights will have access to on the day of the expansion draft, June 20th. There have been some mixed signals about how public the protected lists will be. The latest I had heard was those lists would be kept completely secret, which while it is a little frustrating to reporters like me who are looking to write stories, really is Ok. After all, the NHL doesn't owe the media the freedom to peruse those lists. And I even understand the concept of keeping those lists private so as not to "upset the apple cart" within the teams themselves. Every team will only lose one player and the other players who were left exposed probably don't even want to know they were left exposed...
There is logic to that...
However some teams I have talked to do think those lists she be available for all the other teams to view because not having them available, to go along with the policy of Vegas trades not needing to be made public until after the Draft, gives the Knights a HUGE advantage and could cause other teams to protect players they wouldn't otherwise if they knew of the moves Vegas has already made...
However, here is where I just don't understand the protected lits rules:
The current rules of the expansion draft now state, as least as I understand it, that the protected lists will be made public AFTER Vegas has picked from them on June 21st. OK....Why would the NHL do that?
By releasing the protected lists AFTER the team has been selected all you are doing is pissing a whole slew of players off who weren't selected, remain with the team that exposed them, and have to continue playing for a team they may perceive doesn't want them.
To me this is the WORST of all options. Either make the lists public from the start or never, but like I said I keep hearing there are many who are telling me the details of these lists aren't yet written in stone.
What's the BUZZ??
What do you think they should do?
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