So, now that the Stanley Cup final is over I am going to make this thread for the upcoming season. Mostly I want it here because of the upcoming expansion draft and regular draft and free agency. I imagine this year will be much more interesting than the average year because of the expansion draft with the Las Vegas Golden Knights.

So, feel free to come here with any updates related to NHL Hockey. Any news or rumors or anything like that are more than welcome.

I'll try and post regularly but I'll need others to post in here too so that I can keep posting

It could be just a rumor, but I heard Dustin Brown from the LA Kings could be in the works to join the new Golden Knights franchise. It would be a great start as far as talent and leadership goes for Vegas.

MattyIce : and a great way for LA to get out of at least 1 terrible contract. I wonder how many picks that is going to cost LA.... cause I wouldn't take Dustin Brown for nothing. He's not an effective enough player for that considering what he costs.

Trades so far:

Washington Capitals get F Tyler Graovac and Minnesota Wild get 2018 5th-Round Pick.
Montreal Canadiens get F Jonathan Drouin, 2018 6th Round Pick (Conditional) and Tampa Bay Lightning get D Mikhail Sergachev, 2018 2nd Round Pick (Conditional)
Arizona Coyotes get C Nick Cousins, G Merrick Madsen and Philadelphia Flyers get LW Brendan Warren, 2018 5th Round Pick
Buffalo Sabres get D Nathan Beaulieu and Montreal Canadiens get 2017 3rd Round Pick
Calgary Flames get G Mike Smith Arizona Coyotes get 3rd Round Pick (Conditional), D Brandon Hickey
and G Chad Johnson.
New Jersey Devils get D Mirco Mueller and 2017 5th Roundd-Pick San Jose Sharks get 2017 2nd Round-Pick and 2017 4th-Round Pick.

Interesting start so far. Drouin trade was obviously the biggest one so far. Drouin had a solid season last year so hopefully he can help Montreal with their offense. Not sure if I would have given up Sergachev for Drouin personally but Yzerman did well with Drouin getting this trade done.

I'm excited to see what happens with the upcoming expansion draft coming up. It will be especially interesting to see what teams pay in order to not lose a single player.

Forwards

Teemu Pulkkinen (selected from Arizona Coyotes)
William Carrier (Buffalo Sabres)
Cody Eakin (Dallas Stars)
Tomas Nosek (Detroit Red Wings)
Jonathan Marchessault (Florida Panthers)
Reilly Smith (via trade with Florida Panthers)
Connor Brickley (Carolina Hurricanes)
Chris Thorburn (Winnipeg Jets)
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare (Philadelphia Flyers)
Nikita Gusev (via trade with Tampa Bay Lightning)
Mikhail Grabovski (via trade with New York Islanders)
James Neal (Nashville Predators)
Brendan Leipsic (Toronto Maple Leafs)
David Perron (St. Louis Blues)
Oscar Lindberg (New York Rangers)
Erik Haula (Minnesota Wild)
Alex Tuch (via trade with Minnesota Wild)
William Karlsson (Columbus Blue Jackets)
David Clarkson (via trade with Columbus Blue Jackets)

Defensemen

Luca Sbisa (Vancouver Canucks)
Jon Merrill (New Jersey Devils)
Brayden McNabb (Los Angeles Kings)
Jason Garrison (Tampa Bay Lightning)
Jake Bischoff (via trade with New York Islanders)
Deryk Engelland (Calgary Flames)
Colin Miller (Boston Bruins)
Marc Methot (Ottawa Senators)
David Schlemko (San Jose Sharks)
Griffin Reinhart (Edmonton Oilers)
Alexei Emelin (Montreal Canadiens)
Clayton Stoner (Anaheim Ducks)
Shea Theodore (via trade with Anaheim Ducks)
Trevor van Riemsdyk (Chicago Blackhawks)
Nate Schmidt (Washington Capitals)

Goaltenders

Marc-Andre Fleury (Pittsburgh Penguins)
Calvin Pickard (Colorado Avalanche)
Jean-Francois Berube (New York Islanders)

also....

1st round (2017) from Jets
1st round (2017) from Islanders
2nd round (2017) from Lightning
2nd round (2019) from Islanders
2nd round (2019) Blue Jackets
2nd round (2020) from Penguins
3rd round (2019) from Jets
4th round (2018) from Lightning
5th round (2017) from Hurricanes
6th round (2017) from Sabres

Pretty interesting roster so far. I imagine there is a lot of opportunity to improve the forwards but I think defense and goaltending are actually solid. It is nice to see that this roster won't be a joke this year.... at least on paper. We'll see how things play out in real games but it looks good right now.

Looks like Columbus upgraded on the offensive side in picking up Panarin from Chicago. The contract is 2 years / $7 million. I remember some Blackhawks fans during Panarin's rookie-of-the-year season 2 years ago saying "He's the future of the Blackhawks." I wonder what they think of him now lol

Chicago also sent over Tyler Motte and a 6th round pick in the 2017 draft. Columbus traded forward Brandon Saad. He has 3 years left on a 6 year / $36 million contract. Anton Forsberg and a 5th round pick in next year's draft were also sent to Chicago.

Ugh, I haven't been able to post in here for a while but SO Much has happened. Lots of trades, lots of signings. McDavid's enormous contract extension.

I'd try and list even a part of what has happened but it would take way too long to compile.

I want to get into hockey this season, but I don't know what team to root for. I want to root for a team that is a contender, but they are also right there on the edge. I also would love to root for an "underdog" story. Another thing, and I hope people don't take this the wrong way, but I wouldn't mind rooting for a team that has a player who is actually decent who is black. I think it is a little funny that football and basketball are majority African Americans, but hockey, last I heard anyways, had only 3 African American professional players. 

My friend roots for the Predators, and he doesn't like the Penguins because of Crosby. He says that he's the NHL's "Golden Boy", so he gets away with a lot of stuff. However, another one of my friends is a Penguins fan. It's just weird, and I really don't know how to pick a team. 

Any suggestions before the season starts?

thing1 : first off, there are more than 3 black players. Sure they don't represent 50+% of the players like Football and Basketball but there are more than 3


As for teams to root for.... that's hard to say. I'm more in the camp of I have teams I refuse to cheer for and then everyone else is on a sliding scale of who I like more than the other team.

geeogree : Well, I am currently debating the Preds. My friend said that their black player is actually really good. They're kind of an underdog story because they are relatively new to the league ( I think? ). They got one of their first playoff runs, and then they lost in the finals, 4-2. 

thing1 : well, they won't really be the underdogs this year will they? I mean, a trip to the finals and you can't really be the underdog in the next season.

Also, what does it matter if a team has a black player or not?

Because it's not really a thing. I don't know how to explain it without sounding like a bad person. It's just like a "damn, you don't see too many black players. This dude must be really good." It makes me want to root for them. 
Kind of like Yao Ming got really popular for a few months in the NBA a couple of years ago. 

thing1 : ah, fair enough. I just was wondering what the curiosity was with it.

Preds will be a good team to cheer for this year if you want a team to cheer for. You could also look for a list of all the teams with black players and cheer for those teams

I hoping that Anaheim will do better this year. We have been so close every year, but never make it to the finals

thing1 : If you ask me, I would root for Ovi to win one. Of course I'm talking about Alex Ovechkin from the Capitals. Although I don't like any of the sports teams coming out of DC ... the Washington Redskins because I was a Cowboys fan growing up, and the Washington Nationals because of Bryce Harper mostly ... I have a different view of the Capitals. It doesn't matter what the sport is, I seem to gravitate towards the underdog and cheer for them, especially if I'm watching a game and I don't have a dog in the fight.

In my opinion, the next player that deserves to win his first one is definitely Ovi. This year, he ran into the buzzsaw that was Sidney Crosby and his Penguins. But Ovi took him to 7 games this time. I was rooting for the Capitals pretty hard in that game, but they couldn't get any offense going. Perhaps next time he will come out on top. We will have to see.

MattyIce : part of me wants Ovi to win and part of me wants to watch him never win ever. I've never been a big fan of him as a player. He seems so 1-dimensional and when he's not contributing offensively he basically disappears as a player. A lot of other stars contribute in other ways when they aren't producing well offensively but watching Ovi if he isn't scoring he isn't doing much else on the ice.

And it makes me laugh that he hasn't gotten out of the 2nd round. I do want to watch a new team win though. Crosby and the Pens have won back to back and now it is time for someone else to be in the finals from the East.

So the regular season is getting very, very close to starting and I'm really interested to see how things play out.

I feel like the top teams got worse from last year to this year which means there is a good chance of someone else winning the cup. Not that I'm mad that Pittsburgh won again because I do like their team but I would like to see new teams get there (maybe a Canadian one).

Still, I always look forward to a new season of hockey to watch. I don't know how regularly I will update this thread because I know I won't get a ton of responses from people but hopefully someone replies often enough to keep it lively

So, the regular season has started and already I can imagine fans in Toronto are losing their minds.

7-2 win over Winnipeg (big deal honestly...) and they're probably already planning the parade. No doubt they are a good team and could win but there are a lot of other good teams out there with plans to win.

One of those being Pittsburgh who lost their season opener in OT to St. Louis. Solid game from what I saw of it and hopefully a sign of things to come for St. Louis. I've liked St. Louis for a while but they don't seem to be able to quite get anything going in the playoffs.

2 more games going on right now. Calgary and Edmonton, BATTLE OF ALBERTA!, and Philly and San Jose (cause, you need to play eventually, why not right away?).

A bit of a slow opening night to the season but some good games to start with. Looking forward to the hundreds more to come!

I renamed my old thread because it is old and rather than trying to make a new one I'll just keep this one going

I'm pretty happy with the way the season has gone for Calgary. 1st in their division, 4th in the conference and 7th overall. I'd honestly rather have it this way than to be 1st overall in anything. And almost 30 games in means this isn't a fluke of the early part of the season or anything. Only real worry right now is goaltending. Does Smith still have 60 start in him or is the season going to be split more evenly? I'm hoping Rittich keeps going strong and manages to overtake Smith as the #1. Smith hasn't been great this year but Rittich has been solid. Time will tell.

I'm also loving how yet again it seems like things are up in the air. Teams that were expected to be good have been average or bad and some bad teams have been pretty good. I wasn't always a fan of the salary cap system but seeing more parity in teams as the years go by is actually enjoyable. Harder to have true dynasties anymore.