Commissioner Bettman Nails Down June 22 For Expansion Announcement

Gary Bettman delivered his “State of the NHL” today at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh.

As expected, the commissioner didn’t have much to say about expansion when asked, but he did at least give us one specific date.

Prior to the Awards event the Board of Governors will meet and I anticipate being able to provide a more definitive word on where the expansion process stands. That word will probably come in one of three following forms. Whether there will be no expansion, whether expansion will be deferred to a later time in the future, or whether there will be expansion and if so whether will be a one team or two teams expansion.

I am not going to handicap what’s going to happen, but again when the board meets in Las Vegas on June 22 I am fairly certain that we will know more than we do today I also anticipate that the executive committee will be making a recommendation to the board in advance of that meeting. -Gary Bettman

On when the Executive Committee may make official recommendation…

I think it will be in advance of the meeting. I don’t think ‘the morning of’ is the advance I had in mind. It’ll probably be a week or so at least in advance as to what the recommendation of theExecutiveCommittee will be. It hasn’t been finalized yet so if you start calling members of the Executive Committee when you leave this room, I don’t think it will get you the answer you want, you need to be a little bit more patient. But as I said we are expecting to be in a position where you’ll have more definitive information, as will everybody.

On a team starting in 17-18

We have said that’s the earliest it could happen. It could be that one of the decisions made is expansion is gonna happen but it’s deferred a year… or more. Nothing about our current timing precludes 17-18. -Bill Daly

The commissioner and deputy commissioner also:

• Denied the NFL had any impact on the decision. They have not spoken to Roger Goodell.
• Confirmed the Executive Committee stands at nine with the passing of Flyers’ Ed Snider.
• Refused to discuss the “lingering issues” with the process.
• Said they have waived the minimum/maximum payroll threshold for teams to meet in an expansion draft.
• Reconfirmed players with No Trade Clauses (NTCs) can be exposed.
• Expansion team would participate in draft lottery.
• Say they have run expansion draft models and believe the expansion team would immediately be competitive for a playoff spot.
• Claimed there will be “a significant penalty” for teams that do not comply with the Expansion Draft rules.

The Executive Committee still must meet, which will happen some time in the next two weeks, and then the Board of Governors meeting will be held on June 22nd.

The official announcement should come at the NHL Awards show, also on June 22nd, but we should have the good news prior to that as once the recommendation is finalized, the Board of Governors vote is essentially a formality.