Vegas Golden Knights Inaugural Season Final Grades: David Perron

David Perron provided leadership, skill and the best season of his career with the Vegas Golden Knights.

Fans, media and everyone else in between set expectations low for the Vegas Golden Knights. In 2017-18. However, the team and coaching staff had different ideas and turned the tables on the entire NHL. The Golden Knights went out and proved everyone wrong in their very first campaign.

Just about every single player on the Golden Knights roster went above and beyond expectations. Every player bought into Gerard Gallant’s fast transition style of play, and it worked to near perfection. On VegasHockeyKnight.com, we will go over each player with an in-depth analysis and give them a grade based upon their performance during the Golden Knights inaugural season.

Today we wrap up our talk about the Golden Knights second line with another departing player. David Perron gave everything he had to the fans of Las Vegas, and his work ethic proved that. Let’s take a look at the year the Sherbrooke, Quebec native had in a Golden Knights uniform.

I had no problem whatsoever with the Golden Knights picking David Perron up from the St. Louis Blues at the expansion draft. As a matter of fact, I loved this pickup at the time. But I thought for sure he would be flipped at the trade deadline for prospects or draft picks at the trade deadline. That didn’t, and that was a good thing for the Golden Knights.

Perron has always been known as a journeyman middle forward throughout his time in the NHL. He has already played on a list of five NHL teams which includes the Golden Knights, Blues, Ducks, Penguins, and Oilers. His veteran leadership and personality shined throughout the locker room.

Perron was very clear that he wasn’t excited at first to play for Vegas in his Players Tribune article. However, after getting texts and calls from goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury, his whole mood changed. Ironically, Perron had the best season of his NHL career with the Golden Knights in 2017-18.

In 70 games played, Perron ended up with 16 goals, 50 assists, and 66 points. He may have been playing in a contract year, but there’s no denying the success the veteran forward had. It also helps that he played on a line consistently with James Neal and Erik Haula.

Although, everything changed for the 30-year old during the 2018 Stanley Cup Playoffs. Despite putting up great regular season numbers, his production dipped drastically when the postseason hit. In 15 postseason games, Perron totaled just one goal, eight assists, and nine points. The Sherbrooke, Quebec native may have been playing with an injury, but there’s no doubt he didn’t play up to his full potential.

On July 1st, the St. Louis Blues are welcoming back Perron as he signed a four-year contract with the club. It will be his third stint with the team in the course of his ten-year career. The Golden Knights will miss Perron in more ways than one, but at the end of the day, the money wasn’t right.

Grade: B+

The Vegas Golden Knights had a deadly top-six forward group in 2017-18. That top-six will look very different in the 2018-19 season. The question is will the Golden Knights forward group continue to keep scoring at a high rate, or does everything suddenly come back to earth?