31 protected lists and 31 picks in the NHL’s all-time expansion draft

It’s expansion draft week, which is great because expansion drafts rock. Hockey fans had to wait a generation between NHL drafts, and we might have a long wait before we see another one. This week, I want as much expansion nonsense as I can get.

Luckily, nonsense is what I do best. So today, I want to revisit something I wrote four years ago: The all-time expansion draft.

Back then, as the league was getting set to welcome a Vegas Golden Knights team we all agreed would be terrible, I decided to come up with an all-time protected list for each NHL franchise. I used the modern rules, which is to say each team could protect one goalie and either seven forwards and three defenseman, or eight…