The Vegas Golden Knights traded defenseman Nicolas Hague to the Nashville Predators for forward Colton Sissons and defenseman Jeremy Lauzon Sunday night, according to a report by TSN\u2019s Darren Dreger.<\/p>\n
Hague was a pending restricted free agent in need of a new deal \u2014 and a sizable raise. Rather than signing him, the Golden Knights opted to trade him to the Predators, who immediately signed the 26-year-old defenseman to a four-year contract worth $5.5 million per year, Dreger reported. Hague had a cap hit of $2.3 million this season.<\/p>\n
Hague is a big, rangy defenseman who played mostly bottom-pair minutes in Vegas, but has proven he\u2019s capable of playing on the top pair for stretches. He has a big slap shot, kills penalties and has totaled 20 career goals and 63 assists in six years with the Golden Knights. Based on his usage in Vegas, the $5.5 million cap hit feels a bit steep, but he received few offensive opportunities behind several offensively gifted blueliners in Vegas. If the Predators find a way to use his booming slap shot from the point more often, he could have more upside than his stats show.<\/p>\n
In return, Vegas added another bottom-six forward in Sissons. The 31-year-old had only 21 points in 72 games last season in Nashville and has one year left on his contract with a cap hit of $2,857,143. He had played his entire 11-year NHL career with the Predators, registering 95 goals and 126 assists in 690 games.<\/p>\n
Lauzon, 28, had one assist in only 28 games for the Predators last season after suffering a season-ending lower-body injury in late December. He is also entering the final year of his contract with a cap hit of $2 million.<\/p>\n
Why Vegas made the trade<\/p>\n
Hague\u2019s raise to $5.5 million per year is quite a big bump up from his previous $2.3 million cap hit. It\u2019s understandable if the Golden Knights didn\u2019t think they could fit that into their tight cap situation, which could get even tighter if they win the Mitch Marner sweepstakes.<\/p>\n
Along those lines, there were reports on Saturday that Vegas\u2019 fourth line center, Nicolas Roy, could be included in a trade to Toronto for Marner\u2019s rights. If Roy is moved, Sissons would be an excellent fit to replace Roy\u2019s minutes, both at even strength and on the penalty kill.<\/p>\n
It is a bit curious that a team looking to shed Hague\u2019s salary ended up taking back nearly $5 million in cap hit in this deal. It suggests that the Golden Knights are far from done when it comes to moves this summer.<\/p>\n
(Photo: Ethan Miller \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Vegas Golden Knights traded defenseman Nicolas Hague to the Nashville Predators for forward Colton Sissons and defenseman…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":27148,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[3111,293,62,67,132,68,3116],"class_list":{"0":"post-27147","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-nashville-predators","9":"tag-nhl","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us","14":"tag-vegas-golden-knights"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114772417342989557","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27147\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}