Think back to 2017. The Vegas Golden Knights weren’t even a team yet and they were just preparing to get the ball rolling with the expansion draft. Vegas was able to not only pluck a ton of good and underrated players away from around the league, but they also managed to accumulate quit a few draft picks through deals with teams.
One of those included the Winnipeg jets, and four years later… their decision has turned into a headache. Let us explain.
The Jets found themselves in a position where they didn’t want to lose veteran defenceman Toby Enstrom or forward Marko Dano, so to protect them, they sent Vegas some draft picks with the agreement that they would take Chris Thorburn in the draft instead. One of those picks was used to take Nick Suzuki, who was ultimately included in the Max Pacioretty deal.
Now, Suzuki is helping the Habs torched the Jets with two goals through three games and has arguably been their best forward in the playoffs so far. Crazy the way things work out…
Yikes.
Enstrom went on to play just one more season and 43 regular season games for the Jets while Dano struggled to even crack the lineup, and has not seen much NHL action since. Suzuki, on the other hand, is just 21 and already had 82 points in 127 games. It’s not out of the question either for him to eventually meet the squad that drafted him in the coming rounds, as the Golden Knights managed to even up their series with the Avs at twos with a 5-1 win on Sunday night.
With the Seattle Kraken expansion draft just around the corner, it’s going to be interesting to see how players go about protecting some of their players. Maybe this should be used as an example for teams to be weary of…
(H/T Thomas Drance)
