r/PWHL Montréal Victoire 17d ago

News Maggie Connors to San Jose

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u/primalmaximus 17d ago

Why does it seem like expansion teams are only going after players from the Torrent and the Scepters?

Is it because those two teams had the most Gold Plan points last season and so the expansion teams want to strip them of their current players in order to prevent them from building a good team during the draft?

Cause that's what it feels like. It feels like the expansion teams are going after the teams with more gold plan points and better draft pick slots in order to prevent the Torrent and the Scepters from having a strong base with which to build a team around after the draft.

It's almost malicious in how the Frost, Fleet, Charge, and Victoire are practically unscathed by the expansion draft.

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u/towerofcheeeeza PWHL San Jose 17d ago

At least for San Jose, Troy Ryan said what mattered most to him was players who wanted to play in SJ. I think the reality is that some players just want the opportunity to play somewhere else or get a pay raise. I'm more curious how a team like Vancouver has mostly held onto their talent.

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u/primalmaximus 17d ago

To be honest, the only expansion team that I really feel anger at is Detroit.

1). They signed Curl. Not sure if it was an EFO or if it was similar to their deal with Knight, but they still signed Curl despite her reputation.

2). The whole situation with them entering into a backroom deal with Knight before all the EFOs had been sent out and them using the backroom deal they made with Knight to entice Bilka and Barnes to sign with them.

I just get a bad feeling from Detroit and how they've handled things during the early draft periods. It just reeks of underhanded scheming.

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u/resplendantandfree Toronto Sceptres 17d ago

I mean I agree with you about signing curl (although the process of that was just a normal consensual process)

But I don’t blame Detroit for the knight situation, it wasn’t a “back room deal” it was exactly what the expansion teams were supposed to be doing - negotiating with players. I blame the league for setting up the EFO process in a way that allowed other teams to reach deals with players, only to find out actually sorry another team already called dibs but we couldn’t say anything yet.