The Vegas Golden Knights may have a lot of fun for years to come if they select these players.
The time has finally arrived folks. It’s Vegas Golden Knights week! This week will be by far the busiest week in the history of this franchise as the team gets ready for the expansion and entry drafts. And not only will they have to talk about that, but today they’re also given an exclusive window to speak to any unrestricted and restricted free agents.
Vegas Golden Knights General Manager George McPhee has stated that he’ll give every opportunity to teams trying to keep their players. Obviously, it’ll have to come with a price of draft picks in return to not select individual players. Even if McPhee didn’t want to make any trades, the roster of this team would be in fantastic shape heading into entry draft weekend.
While I was looking at the protection lists, I noticed there are a lot of notable players exposed to the Golden Knights. Some names left me shocked and baffled as to why they would leave a particular player unprotected. Perhaps there’s already deals in place with certain clubs and Golden Knights. However, those moves won’t be announced until Wednesday night at the expansion draft.
So what I’ve done is compiled a list of players that were left unprotected by all 30 NHL clubs, and I picked the five players the Golden Knights should take in the expansion draft. Some of these players were left unprotected for a reason (from potential side deals), but it’s fun to speculate if these players do become Golden Knights. So without further ado, here’s my list players McPhee needs to consider.
5. Petr Mrazek
This one left me in shock. Instead of protecting Mrazek, the Red Wings went the other way keeping fellow goaltender Jimmy Howard. Howard is 33 years old and has a huge contract that comes with two more years of term and a 5.291 million dollar cap hit.
Meanwhile, Mrazek still has the potential to be a decent NHL goaltender. Think about it, his contract year is next year, he’s only 25 years old, and he has a lot to prove. Last year, Mrazek had an awful season finishing with an 18-21-9 record with a GAA of 3.04, and a save percentage of .901.
Let’s take into consideration he was playing for a horrible Red Wings team. But make no mistake about it, he needed to be better for Detroit, and he simply wasn’t. Howard was injured for most of the 2016-17 season, but he put up far more impressive numbers than Mrazek.
It’s up to Vegas if they want to take a chance with Mrazek. I think it’s a low risk, high reward play from a Golden Knights point of view. But there may be other goaltenders out there that interest George McPhee more than the Ostrava, Czechoslovakia native.