Post by bjernagris (PHI) on Apr 18, 2018 5:50:44 GMT -5
Hi all GMs,
A proposal has been put forward to the Exec Board regarding rights to players drafted from Russia, and we would like to announce a vote regarding a rule change.
Under current league rules, rights to players drafted from Russia expire three years after their draft date, similar to other European leagues as well as Canadian junior leagues. Since the NHL and the Russian Hockey Federation have no player transfer agreement, players under contract in Russian leagues cannot be signed by NHL teams (just like players under contract in North America cannot be signed by Russian teams). This means that if a player drafted from Russia signs a contract that extends past their current draftee rights deadline, the team holding those rights lose them without getting a chance to sign the player. We have seen this happen several times in the league (some of the more notable examples are Mikhail Bitsadze, Jacob Grönhagen and Grigori Denisenko).
The current proposal aims to mirror the real NHL rules, where draftee rights for players in Russia do not expire. As rights expire in-game, they would be added back manually to the team who lost their rights to give that team a chance to offer a contract if/when the player becomes a free agent.
This rule change would not mean that we would start manually releasing players from Russia in any other way than we do currently.
It also would start to apply to draftees from the upcoming (2024) Entry Draft, i.e. not retroactively. The reason is that some GMs might have made draft decisions based on the current rules and it would not be fair to those GMs to change rules retroactively.
EDIT: This rule would only apply to players drafted out of Russia. If a player is drafted from a non-Russian league and then signs there, the rule would NOT apply.
Please have your say below and vote at latest Sunday, April 29th.
Thank you!
The Exec Board
A proposal has been put forward to the Exec Board regarding rights to players drafted from Russia, and we would like to announce a vote regarding a rule change.
Under current league rules, rights to players drafted from Russia expire three years after their draft date, similar to other European leagues as well as Canadian junior leagues. Since the NHL and the Russian Hockey Federation have no player transfer agreement, players under contract in Russian leagues cannot be signed by NHL teams (just like players under contract in North America cannot be signed by Russian teams). This means that if a player drafted from Russia signs a contract that extends past their current draftee rights deadline, the team holding those rights lose them without getting a chance to sign the player. We have seen this happen several times in the league (some of the more notable examples are Mikhail Bitsadze, Jacob Grönhagen and Grigori Denisenko).
The current proposal aims to mirror the real NHL rules, where draftee rights for players in Russia do not expire. As rights expire in-game, they would be added back manually to the team who lost their rights to give that team a chance to offer a contract if/when the player becomes a free agent.
This rule change would not mean that we would start manually releasing players from Russia in any other way than we do currently.
It also would start to apply to draftees from the upcoming (2024) Entry Draft, i.e. not retroactively. The reason is that some GMs might have made draft decisions based on the current rules and it would not be fair to those GMs to change rules retroactively.
EDIT: This rule would only apply to players drafted out of Russia. If a player is drafted from a non-Russian league and then signs there, the rule would NOT apply.
Please have your say below and vote at latest Sunday, April 29th.
Thank you!
The Exec Board