Off-season Rule Changes

[Jiri Hrdina]

Hey everyone
As we start our off-season, we wanted to share upcoming rule changes and perspective on the league.

Let’s start with the latter.

Our assessment is that the league is very healthy. We have, for the most part, a group of engaged GMs. The game is much different now. Years ago, many of us would spend hours, several times a day, on chat apps negotiating deals well into the night. I think a lot of us have gotten older and now balance careers, families and other hobbies. And I think many GMs are more thoughtful in building their teams. So there isn’t the same level of trade activity but we don’t think that’s the right way to assess overall health.
We also see a lot of great examples of formerly asset weak teams that have built up a solid foundation. Washington has Connor McDavid – would anyone have predicted that 3 years ago? There are several other examples you can find. We think that the asset distribution across the league is as good as it’s been. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t opportunities to further improve the competitive balance.

So with that in mind, we will be introducing the following changes

Team Changes
- The Arizona Coyotes will move to Philly and move to the Metro
- The current Philly team will move to Winnipeg and move to the Pacific
- The Nashville Predators will move to Boston and move to the Atlantic
- The Red Wings will move to the Central

Changes to Futher Help Asset Weak Teams
- When a weak asset team becomes available, the team will be offered to the other league GMs. GMs of strong asset franchises can take over the weaker team and transition up to 3 assets of their choosing from their prior club. This must be approved by the commissioners to ensure that the former club is strong enough to be eligible and will not be materially weakened by losing 3 assets. Intended outcome: Incentives for veteran GMs to takeover weaker clubs. Opportunity to move assets from strong to weak clubs.
- When a new GM takes over a “weak asset” club they will be awarded a compensatory pick at the end of each draft round for the next draft. These draft picks cannot be traded. The pick must be made. The prospect selected can be traded. If there are multiple compensatory picks the order of them will be set by the commissioners based on evaluating the quality of the asset base. The weakest asset base will be awarded the highest compensatory pick. Intended outcome: provides new GMs of weak clubs some additional assets to work with.
- Starting immediately, any ECHL player with a rating above an established threshold (released as part of re-rates) must be signed in the off-season as part of the RFA process, regardless of how many years remaining on their contract. Intended outcome: Prevent hoarding of NHL players in the ECHL while getting those players to their higher priced RFA deals faster
- Starting in for the 2024 draft, we will remove the 5th round of the annual draft. Intended outcome: More drafted prospects available in the supplement draft that is held annually for weak asset clubs

We think these are a sensible set of changes that will further drive asset distribution across the league, over the long-term, without creating a huge amount of disruption?

So we aren’t expanding?
No. Our view is that the league is healthier with a smaller number of good GMs, and that fewer teams helps with asset distribution.

We don’t expect everyone to love these changes. Some may feel we aren’t going far enough, some may think the changes aren’t ones they would make. But our evaluation is that these are reasonable moves to make that will help improve the game further.

[BagoPucks]

I like the intent of these changes. Interesting to see 13 teams in the West and 15 in the East. Good job coming up with these. I think the changes are enough tweaks to move the needle slightly towards helping the asset weak teams

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by BagoPucks

I like the intent of these changes. Interesting to see 13 teams in the West and 15 in the East. Good job coming up with these. I think the changes are enough tweaks to move the needle slightly towards helping the asset weak teams

I confused myself on this thinking it was currently 15 and 13. I don't know why I thought that. It's 14-14 and will remain so after these changes.

Unless I'm somehow still confused.

[savardandjokinen]

You said nashville will stay in the east but they are in the west

Might make most sense to move detroit back to the west?

[Swayze11]

Great changes guys!

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by savardandjokinen

You said nashville will stay in the east but they are in the west

Might make most sense to move detroit back to the west?

Got it! Yes.
And I agree that makes sense.

[JonDuke]

I've asked about moving Philly to Winnipeg for years now. Why are we moving Arizona there instead?

[Jiri Hrdina]

Because it's the team that makes the most sense to move. If we move Philly then someone will want Philly. Trying not to make this a huge deal.
We'll need your help to make the site changes.

[savardandjokinen]

How about Edmonton to Winnipeg? Winnipeg is my 2nd favorite nhl team and I got lots of family there so it’s basically a second home, and I despise the city of Edmonton. And I highly doubt anyone will ever want edmonton as their city

Don’t want to make things harder so if this is an issue please don’t worry about it, but I’ve asked about Edmonton to Winnipeg in the past as well

[JonDuke]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

Because it's the team that makes the most sense to move. If we move Philly then someone will want Philly. Trying not to make this a huge deal.
We'll need your help to make the site changes.

I'm not trying to make it a huge deal either as it's not the end of the world at all. But I am pointing out that I've mentioned, yearly, that I would love to move to Winnipeg and am wondering why moving Arizona made more sense. For a change this big, I simply wish there was more discussion about it before the league made their decision, that's all. I'm over it.

[SportsJunky]

Hey this is fun. Can I move Buffalo to Quebec?

[Cheese]

Working to get the website switched over to the Simon version with online line changes. There will be interruptions to the site while under construction.

[MJK]

Online line submission are coming?!??!?

AWESOME!

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by JonDuke

I'm not trying to make it a huge deal either as it's not the end of the world at all. But I am pointing out that I've mentioned, yearly, that I would love to move to Winnipeg and am wondering why moving Arizona made more sense. For a change this big, I simply wish there was more discussion about it before the league made their decision, that's all. I'm over it.

The alternative would be Philly to Winnipeg, Arizona to Philly.
Honestly not a big deal for me either. Just wouldn't want the dominoes to fall further.

[MJK]

Whats Flambers think of that? If he is ok with that I say Winnipeg to JonDuke!

[Knut]

A lot of players are already exiled from the league on the Philly roster. It’s not really fair to further exile them to Winnipeg.

[JonDuke]

I'm not 100% sure I'm staying yet so no need to to overturn the decision. I was more curious as to why Arizona was chosen and believe that input from more GMs would have been nice with a larger change like this.

[Swayze11]

Originally Posted by JonDuke

I'm not 100% sure I'm staying yet so no need to to overturn the decision. I was more curious as to why Arizona was chosen and believe that input from more GMs would have been nice with a larger change like this.

Oh you’re staying

[agulati]

Happy with most of the changes. Selfishly, what happens to 5th round picks that have been acquired in trades for the 2024 draft? Is that asset just lost? I think it might not be a bad idea to implement those changes in the 2025 draft, since we had the ability this year to trade 2024 picks.

Also is there going to be something done about players who have missed a significant chunk of the season in the NHL but are expected to be back in the NHL? They do not be getting a playable rating in the packages we receive historically. Are we just stuck with the contracts? For instance some examples would be Landeskog, Couturier, Brown etc. We had previously done it that they do get a decent rating based on their past but lower durability etc.

[Jiri Hrdina]

I would prefer to make the change to remove fifths next summer to get to that benefit sooner. We could keep the ones traced but that doesn’t seem fair

On the second we will wait and see how the new ratings handle those players