There’s a “growing sense” that the Predators will leave Matt Duchene exposed in the Expansion Draft
The Nashville Predators have a tricky situation at the upcoming Seattle Kraken Expansion Draft.
The Preds have a handful of quality defencemen they’d like to protect. @Roman Josi has a no-movement clause and both @Ryan Ellis and @Mattias Ekholm are no-brainers. Former first-round @Dante Fabbro also seems like an obvious choice to protect from Seattle, but the breakout season of @Alexandre Carrier complicates matters.
Nashville has already made one trade with the Expansion Draft in mind. Knowing they wouldn’t be able to fit @Viktor Arvidsson into their protection scheme, they sent him off to Los Angeles in exchange for a pair of draft picks. They might wind up doing the same with one of these defenders before losing them to Seattle for nothing.
Also, Pierre LeBrun reports that there’s a growing sense that the Predators might leave @Matt Duchene unprotected from Seattle…
There's a growing sense that the Predators might leave Matt Duchene unprotected in the expansion draft. Has five more years on his deal at an $8M AAV. @TSNHockey @TheAthletic
— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) July 13, 2021
Duchene has been a disappointment since arriving in Nashville. He inked a seven-year deal worth $56,000,000 back on July 1, 2019, and has just 55 points in 100 games since.
If Nashville leaves Duchene exposed, they could roll with a very unconventional eight-skater protection scheme in which they protect five defenders and three forwards from Seattle. That would include Josi, Ellis, Ekholm, Fabro, and Carrier, along with Filip Forsberg, Calle Jarnkrok, and Ryan Johansen.
Given his $8,000,000 cap hit for five more seasons and poor production as of late, it’s no guarantee the Kraken will take a gamble on Duchene.