Most teams in the NHL would never be onboard for a redraft of the entire NHL. But, it is still something cool for fans to look at hypothetically. Entire league redrafts have usually been associated with the NFL. The idea behind them is to break up dynasties in the league, such as the New England Patriots. Although the NHL hasn’t had any Patriot-esque dynasties recently, there’s franchises that have experienced FAR more success than many others. Teams such as the Pittsburgh Penguins, Chicago Blackhawks and New York Rangers have made the post-season the last 11, nine, and seven seasons, respectively. A total of only four teams have won the last eight Stanley Cups.
Photo from turningleft.net
An NHL redraft would give several teams a chance to retool their entire roster. For example, the Carolina Hurricanes, Buffalo Sabres, and Arizona Coyotes all own growing post-season droughts. Carolina’s drought has reached eight seasons, Buffalo six, and Arizona five. All three team’s droughts are very likely to continue at the end of the 2017-2018 season.
Here are some things to consider if this hypothetical idea were ever to come to fruition:
Determining the draft order
One of the most important parts of this hypothetical is how the NHL would determine the order of which the teams would get to draft. Although the 31st pick in the redraft of the NHL would still result in an extremely talented player, the number one overall pick is significantly better.
The team with the top pick gets the choice of how they get to rebuild their roster. They can choose the best player from whichever position on the ice they like. The 31st pick may not have the choice to draft based on position. With a pick that far down they may just take the best player available.
Photo from dailyherald.com
The NHL must determine how to order the redraft. The best way to do that would be to measure the success of each franchise over the last 15 seasons. Then, reward the least successful team with the first overall pick, and the 31st overall pick to the most successful.
The Penguins and Blackhawks have three Cup wins over the last 15 seasons, with the Penguins winning the last two. Pittsburgh would receive the 31st pick, and Chicago the 30th. The Kings have two in the last 15 seasons, giving them the 30th pick.
On the opposite end of the spectrum it would be tougher to decide which team gets the first overall pick because there are several franchises that have never won a Stanley Cup, let alone in the last 15 seasons.
For this we could look at the least amount of playoff appearances, longest post-season droughts, and total regular season losses over the last 15 seasons to work out who gets the first pick.
Which position would be most important?
Redrafting the NHL would essentially be one giant fantasy hockey draft for General Managers and team owners. They would need to decide which positions they would tackle first in the draft.
Would GMs and owners want to target young, talented forwards such as Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews and Jack Eichel? Or would they want to target cornerstone defensive players such as Erik Karlsson, Drew Doughty, P.K. Subban or Brent Burns that can quarterback the offense on the backend and also run the power-play?
But, GMs and owners can’t forget about the guys that backstop the team, the goaltenders. It can be argued that Henrik Lundqvist has been the key to the Rangers’ seven consecutive playoff appearances. Furthermore, you can argue that Jonathan Quick was the most important piece of the Los Angeles Kings roster in 2012 and 2014 when they won Stanley Cup.
Teams could permitted to keep one player
Allowing teams to keep one player would be similar to a fantasy hockey keeper league. In keeper fantasy leagues, owners are allowed to keep a set number of players at the end of the season. They then start the next season with the players that they kept at the end of last season. Heading into the draft, the team already has a few players on the roster. This allows them to focus on other positions because they already have a piece or two in place that they don’t need to draft.
Connor McDavid with Wayne Gretzky. Photo from NHL.com
If this were instituted into the redrafting theory, franchises should be permitted to keep one player if they choose to. This would allow the team to already have a top player of a specific position on their roster so they could draft different positions earlier on. For example, the Edmonton Oilers would likely keep their star forward, Connor McDavid. He’s only 21 years old and easily resembles all-time greats of the sport such as Wayne Gretzky and Sidney Crosby.
Teams would need to pay to keep this player, so the method of how would need to be solidified by the NHL. A great way to do this would to institute a standard, league-wide contract that the kept player would sign to keep them on the roster, similar to an NFL franchise tag. But, this contract’s length and price should be equal no matter the position of the player that is kept. For example, whether the kept player is a forward, defenseman, or a goaltender, the keeper contract standard should be set somewhere around four years, $10 million per season.
Other teams could choose to keep a franchise cornerstone defenseman or goaltender if they don’t feel that they have star talent at the forward position that is worth the $10 million per season contract. Or, if a team feels that they don’t have any player at any position worth $10 million per season, they could choose to not keep any players heading into the redraft and save the money heading into the season.
Ratings, attendance and jersey sales could skyrocket
The first few seasons following the NHL redraft would be electric to watch. All kinds of superstars playing in new cities, with new jerseys, and new players at their sides.
Fans would flock to arenas and televisions to watch their newly rebuilt franchise fight to be the first to win a Stanley Cup following the redraft. There’d be no telling which teams would come out on top. No matter if a team looks good on paper, it’s all about the chemistry on the ice between the players. Teams like the New York Islanders, Arizona Coyotes, and the Carolina Hurricanes would love to see this. These three are among the teams that struggle to fill their arena on game nights. With all new rosters, each team has the potential to be the best in the league. Every arena in the league would be packed all season long.
Plus, jersey sales would go through the roof. Most players, except for those kept on the roster, would be playing for a different team. Fans wouldn’t hesitate to buy their new superstar’s jersey as soon as the draft concluded.
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