Over the last few days, details have emerged about how an expansion draft would work for teams entering the NHL in 2017-18. It’s important to get these details ironed out now, so that general managers can enter this summer with an idea of how they need to structure their teams to protect key pieces.

The Details

NHL.com has the details on the potential expansion draft, which could be as early as the summer of 2017 in time for the 2017-18 season. Key points are as follows:

• Teams would be able to protect up to 11 skaters. It’s believed that clubs would be allowed to protect either a full set of 11 skaters with position requirements (7 forwards, 3 defencemen, 1 goalie) or a group of nine which would allow more protection for defencemen (8 skaters, 1 goalie).
• Players in their first and second seasons of professional hockey would be exempt, as would unsigned draft picks.

That last point requires some clarification, which we get from TSN’s Darren Dreger (via the essential Chris Nichols):

Clarification from Dreger on convo w/ Daly: Nylander would not be exempt from expansion draft. Ehlers would be exempt. #Leafs #NHLJets

— Chris Nichols (@NicholsOnHockey) March 17, 2016

Nylander played 37 games in the AHL in 2014-15, while Ehlers was a rookie pro in 2015-16. By the summer of 2017, Nylander would have completed his third year in pro hockey and would thus be eligible, while Ehlers would have finished his second and thus be protected.

ESPN’s Pierre LeBrun noted that there would also need to be a certain salary threshold exposed:

Other pertinent expansion draft detail: teams must expose enough players which total at least 25 percent of previous season’s payroll

— Pierre LeBrun (@Real_ESPNLeBrun) March 16, 2016

Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman added another interesting point in this week’s 30 Thoughts column: no-move and no-trade clauses. It isn’t clear how those clauses would be treated in an expansion draft, but it’s a very good bet that the NHLPA would fight for at least no-move clauses to be exempt from expansion, meaning that those players would need to be included on a team’s protected list. No-trade clauses, as Friedman notes, are less likely to get the same protection.

So of we’re looking at the Oilers preparedness for an expansion draft in the summer of 2017, what would that look like?

Edmonton’s Protected List

We should start with ineligible players. It’s easy to apply that Nylander/Ehlers distinction above to Edmonton: it means that Connor McDavid would be exempt but that Leon Draisaitl would be eligible.

Exempt List:

• F – Connor McDavid
• F – Anton Slepyshev
• D – Darnell Nurse

Protected List:

• F – Taylor Hall
• F – Leon Draisaitl
• F – Ryan Nugent-Hopkins
• F – Jordan Eberle
• F – Benoit Pouliot
• F – Nail Yakupov
• F – Patrick Maroon
• D – Oscar Klefbom
• D – Brandon Davidson
• D – Andrej Sekera
• G – Cam Talbot

This would expose some pretty interesting players to expansion team(s). Up front the list of players potentially exposed would include (among others) Zack Kassian, Jujhar Khaira, Bogdan Yakimov, Mark Letestu and Iiro Pakarinen. It’s not impossible to picture a scenario where taking dollars into account the Oilers decide to expose Pouliot and protect one of the younger players, though doing so would be unfortunate. Alternatively, Patrick Maroon could be exposed.

The real gems, though, are on defence and in net. Potentially exposed would be Griffin Reinhart, Laurent Brossoit, Mark Fayne, Eric Gryba, Jordan Oesterle and others. Again, it isn’t impossible to imagine a situation where taking salary into account Edmonton would expose Andrej Sekera (he has a no-trade clause, not a no-move clause strike that, he has a no-move clause) and protect Reinhart, though that’s a tough case to make. It’s more likely that Sekera would be exposed if the Oilers brought in a right-shot veteran this summer (someone like Travis Hamonic).

A lot of those players would be appealing to an expansion club, particularly the younger ones. A lot could change in a year but Reinhart is the obvious target given his age in a single-team draft. Brossoit is appealing but there will be a flood of available goalies, so Kassian (or Pouliot) might be the next most attractive pick.

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