NHL invalidates Golden Knights-Ducks Evgenii Dadonov trade

The wildest story to come out of the 2022 NHL trade deadline has to be the Vegas Golden Knights attempt to dump Evgenii Dadonov‘s contract on the Anaheim Ducks in attempt to clear salary cap space.

The Golden Knights were going to send Dadonov and a second-round pick to Anaheim in exchange for Ryan Kesler‘s contract and defenseman John Moore.

On Wednesday, more than 48 hours after the deadline had passed, the NHL announced that trade has been invalidated due to a no-trade clause that was not honored.

Here is what happened: Just before the 3 p.m. ET Monday deadline, the trade was announced by the Golden Knights. The thought process here for Vegas is simple: Take on Kesler’s remaining contract, stash it on long-term injured reserve for the remainder of this season since he is not going to play again in the NHL, and clear some much-needed salary cap space for this season and next season. After acquiring Jack Eichel from the Buffalo Sabres in November, combined with several other major acquisitions in recent seasons, the Golden Knights are pushed to the limits of the league’ salary cap and need to get creative to fit everybody in and remain cap compliant.

Then this happened.

We have become aware of an issue with respect to the trade. We have been consulting with the league office. We will provide further information once it becomes available. #VegasBorn

— Vegas Golden Knights (@GoldenKnights) March 22, 2022

The issue involves a no-trade clause in Dadonov’s contract that nobody from Vegas, to Anaheim, to the NHL itself seemed to know existed.

When Dadonov signed with the Ottawa Senators as a free agent prior to the 2020-21 season, it included a 10-team no-trade clause that Anaheim was included on.

How this got missed remains