Major Trade Nearly Finalized Between the Vegas Golden Knights and the Montreal Canadiens: We Now Know the Habs Attempted to Bring Back Physical Defenseman Alexei Emelin
In the last few hours, we have learned very interesting news regarding the Montreal Canadiens. The former employee of the organization, Marc Dumont, revealed a juicy scoop about a transaction that almost happened between the CH and the Vegas Golden Knights.
Before getting into the heart of the matter, it's because of the work of Nathan Grav from SDPNm who made an assessment of the Knights' 2017 expansion draft, that Dumont was prompted to release this information about the Tricolore.
Florida traded Reilly Smith and a fourth, to Vegas, to TAKE Jonathan Marchessault, to protect Nick Bjugstad.
Columbus protected Scott Hartnell (who didn't play another season with them) against William Karlsson, who went with the Golden Knights.
The Capitals protected Matt Niskanen instead of Nate Schmidt.
The Sabres paid a sixth to Vegas to TAKE William Carrier, they protected Tyler Ennis and Johan Larsson instead.
The Wild traded Alex Tuch to Vegas, so they would select Erik Haula.
Pittsburgh TRADED a second-round pick to Vegas to ensure they selected Marc-André Fleury.
Last but not least, Anaheim traded Shea Theodore so that Vegas would select Clayton Stoner.
NHL general managers did not know how to handle an expansion draft. Wow.»
Dumont then added that Bergevin even tried to repatriate Alexei Emelin, who had just left for Vegas, following the expansion draft.
Excellent physical player, but also one of the worst defenders in the league.»
Taking into account that the Russian defender never played a game with the Knights, and was traded to the Nashville Predators about ten days after the draft, this indicates that Bergevin could very well have brought Emelin back to Montreal.
After all, the Preds only paid a third-round pick to acquire him from Vegas. He eventually played 86 games with this organization before finally leaving for the KHL.
Let's say that with his hefty contract of 4.1 million dollars granted by Bergevin at the time, for a third-pair defender, it would have been a mistake to see him return to Montreal after the release of his contract for free at the expansion draft.
Credit: HabsetLNH.com
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