How Seattle's 2021 expansion draft could impact Stars

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- Hindsight is 20/20 … and also the best friend of most fans.
That was never more clear than after a visit to Las Vegas to see the expansion darlings, the Golden Knights, on Sunday. A team made up of other people's castoffs, Vegas proved last season that there is plenty of talent in the NHL. They found the right players, made the right decisions, and rode all the way to the Stanley Cup Final, before losing to Washington in five games.
And for Stars fans, any visit back gives them another chance to say that Dallas should have protected Cody Eakin in the expansion draft and allowed someone else to go. The same thing happens every time Florida plays Vegas … or Columbus plays Vegas … or Pittsburgh plays Vegas.
The expansion draft is tricky, and time changes a lot of perspectives.

Obviously, Florida wouldn't give away Jonathan Marchessault just to get Vegas to take Reilly Smith now. And Columbus might think twice about letting William Karlsson go. And, yeah, even though Marc-Andre Fleury is 34 and making $5.75 million, maybe Pittsburgh would reconsider trading a second rounder to get Vegas to take the veteran goalie instead of young Matt Murray.
It makes for good barstool conversations.
The Stars' dilemma was an interesting one. They had plenty of centers in Tyler Seguin, Jason Spezza, Radek Faksa and then-prospects Devin Shore and Jason Dickinson. They wanted to protect Valeri Nichushkin even though he was in the KHL, and also liked the physical edge of Antoine Roussel and Brett Ritchie.

They left available players like Eakin, Jamie Oleksiak, Dan Hamhuis and Patrik Nemeth, so Vegas clearly could have taken someone else. That's the nature of the process. It is a gamble in which you try to predict the outcome.
A year later, Eakin is fifth on the Knights in scoring with 19 points (11 goals, eight assists) and is averaging almost 16 minutes per game in ice time. Meanwhile, Roussel left via free agency and Nichushkin and Ritchie are battling to stay in the lineup.
So, you can definitely have a nice talk about a redo if you want.
Mix in the fact that the Stars signed Martin Hanzal to a three-year, free-agent contract that averages $4.75 million, and a lot would be different had the Stars decided to protect Eakin.
That said, who knows what would have happened if Nichushkin or Ritchie would have gone to Vegas? Maybe they would have gone the Karlsson route and blossomed with all of that new opportunity. The process of changing teams can be motivational, so it's tough to make a clear comparison when so many of the variables are, well, variable.
But all of this is worth the chat right now because the Stars will have to go through a similar process in 2021 when Seattle holds its expansion draft. The rules are the same as teams can choose to protect seven forwards, three defensemen and one goalie or eight skaters and one goalie. The guess is the Stars are going to go the seven-forward route, but that does make it interesting when you can project that they will have to protect John Klingberg, Esa Lindell and Miro Heiskanen on defense. That means they could lose a pretty good defensemen.
Now, teams cut deals with Vegas to protect their fourth defenseman, so that could happen again with Seattle. But Dallas has a lot of moving parts on the blueline already, and that is sure to change before 2021. Just predicting the status of Stephen Johns is a chore right now.

Players with no-movement clauses have to be protected, so that means the Stars have to put Jamie Benn, Tyler Seguin, Ben Bishop and Alexander Radulov on their protected list. Likewise, any free agent or trade acquisition who might have a no-movement clause would fit into that group.
That could make the group of players exposed pretty good. Depending on if you want to protect Radek Faksa, Jason Dickinson, Mattias Janmark and Devin Shore, that could leave players like Denis Gurianov or Roope Hintz exposed. That's to say nothing of Nichushkin or Ritchie, if they're still around.
It's a mind-bending process trying to go through all of this when the decisions won't be made for three more summers, and it really does allow you to take a breath and think about the way NHL rosters are built.
Of the players Dallas was pondering protecting or knew they were exposing in 2017, they have lost Roussel, Eakin, Oleksiak, Nemeth, Dan Hamhuis, Curtis McKenzie, Gemel Smith and Kari Lehtonen. And maybe that's the perspective we get from hindsight here.
NHL rosters change yearly, so teams deal with losses every season.
And front offices have to make these kinds of decisions all of the time.
That is a chilling thought when you get right down to it.
This story was not subject to the approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.
Mike Heikais a Senior Staff Writer for DallasStars.com and has covered the Stars since 1994. Follow him on Twitter @MikeHeika, and listen to his podcast.