Vegas Golden Knights: Predicting what might have happened on July 1
Today should have been a fun day for the Vegas Golden Knights and the rest of the NHL.
It is July 1 or Happy Bobby Bonilla Day for New York Mets and Baseball fans. But, for the Vegas Golden Knights, today should have been the start of Free Agency.
One of the flagship events of the NHL calendar, July 1 is normally a blockbuster day for news in the National Hockey League.
Just rewind back to last year when stars in the ilk of Artemi Panarin and Sergei Bobrovsky were the glittering prizes of the free agent market, while big hitters such as Matt Duchene, Joe Pavelski and Mats Zuccarello were also available.
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It didn’t disappoint either with the Florida Panthers paying the big bucks for Bobrovsky, $70,000,000 over seven years to be precise, while the New York Rangers beat out the Panthers and the New York Islanders to land a franchise game-changer in Panarin.
While this year’s Free Agency class wasn’t quite as stacked, there were still some notable names potentially available, including stars such as Washington Capitals goalie Braden Holtby and St. Louis Blues defenseman Alex Pietrangelo.
And, while those players will still get the opportunity to earn a considerable pay day, it will have to wait due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
With the 2019-20 season set to resume at the end of July, Free Agency will have to wait its turn until a Stanley Cup Champion is crowned.
However, today felt empty without the usual madness of Free Agency so we decided to imagine what the day could have looked like for the Vegas Golden Knights.
To preface, these scenarios are based on the normal NHL schedule prior to the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the sporting world to shut down, so we have assumed the 2020 NHL Entry Draft has already taken place.
We came up with a few potential scenarios…