NHL teams had to expose some of their players to the expansion draft over the weekend and the Penguins were forced to make some big names available for selection by the new Seattle Kraken franchise.
The Pens traded Jared McCann to Toronto on Saturday, re-acquiring former second-round draft pick forward Fillip Hallander.
Big names on the Penguins’ list of players exposed to Wednesday expansion draft are forwards Brandon Tanev, Jason Zucker, and Zach Aston-Reese, defensemen Marcus Pettersson and Codi Ceci, and goaltender Casey DeSmith.
Across the league, the biggest name by far of players exposed to the expansion draft is the Montreal Canadiens’ goaltender, Carey Price. Other star players available to the Kraken are Predators center Matt Duchene, Blue Jackets forward Max Domi, Blues forward Vladimir Tarasenko, Devils defenseman PK Subban, and a host of other big-time goaltenders, such as Ryan Miller, Ben Bishop, Jonathan Quick, and Tuukka Rask.
Like Capitals forward Alexander Ovechkin, who was also left unprotected, a lot of the bigger names carry big salary cap hits and have retirement options if they are selected, so they will very likely stay put.
PENGUINS EXPOSED IN THE NHL EXPANSION DRAFT (alphabetically by position)
Defensemen — Cody Ceci, Kevin Czuczman, Mark Friedman, Jesper Lindgren, Andrey Pedan, Marcus Pettersson, Juuso Riikola, Chad Ruhwedel, Yannick Weber
Forwards — Pontus Aberg, Anthony Angello, Zach Aston-Reese, Josh Currie, Frederick Gaudreau, Mark Jankowski, Sam Lafferty, Sam Miletic, Evan Rodrigues, Colton Sceviour, Brandon Tanev, Jason Zucker
Goaltenders — Casey DeSmith, Maxime Lagace
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