In a report that won’t surprise anyone, Pierre LeBrun of TSN writes that teams have considered using the free agent signing window that will be available to the Vegas Golden Knights to their own advantage. In this scenario, Vegas would sign a free agent prior to the expansion draft, only to flip that player to another team after the draft is complete. LeBrun clarifies that this sort of deal would be allowed by the league, though obviously there is no evidence one is in place just yet.
If Vegas were to agree to a deal like this, it means that they would have to relinquish their selection from the free agent’s current team. That might, as LeBrun writes, be beneficial for them if he comes from a team that doesn’t have much exposed anyway. As a purely hypothetical example, Vegas could sign Brian Boyle from the Maple Leafs in the window before the draft, only to flip him to Chicago a few days later. The Golden Knights wouldn’t get anyone else from the Leafs, but would instead collect an asset from the Blackhawks in return for the early signing of Boyle.
Teams around the league that want to speak to free agents a few weeks early may use this tactic to their advantage. No team in the league has more high profile free agents than Washington, but it has previously been expected that the Golden Knights would be interested in Philipp Grubauer, a player who they would have to pass on to use this method on T.J. Oshie, Kevin Shattenkirk or Karl Alzner. That’s also assuming that the Golden Knights themselves aren’t interested in these players, as they should be a front-runner for several sub-30 free agents this summer.
San Jose, home of a few other impressive free agents, will have several interesting defensemen available in the draft and would be a tough place to pass on a selection as well. In all, June is setting up to be one of the more interesting months in hockey transactions in recent history with hundreds of different scenarios available for each team. GMs around the league have continually said that they believe there will be tons of movement as soon as the Stanley Cup is awarded, and should continue right through the draft. This is just one more way teams can possibly get an advantage in the coming weeks.
So they aren’t allowed to select a guy from the free agents previous team in the expansion draft?
If they sign that free agent, correct. For any free agent Vegas signs during the short window they have before the draft, they will forfeit their selection from his current team.
For example, say they want Joe Thornton. If they sign him before the draft, regardless of whether they trade him afterwards, they will not be allowed to select a player from San Jose.
Any free agents they sign post-July 1st will not change anything.
So the only way they’ll likely do this is if a team really likes a certain free agent and will blow Vegas away with an offer? What’s a realistic return they might get?
Only do a sign and trade if the team they are signing the player away from (like Toronto) doesn’t have much to offer in the expansion draft. But they could jump the gun, so to speak, and take a player like Alzner away from Washington in a signing, give up that draft selection and still keep that player as he would be free agent who now has a contract. Hope that helps but the league is basically winging it day by day anyway