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The 3 biggest surprises from Vegas' expansion draft

Dave Sandford / National Hockey League / Getty

With many of Vegas' expansion-draft selections being leaked by reporters hours before the announcement, there weren't a ton of surprises among the roster picks. However, with an abundance of side deals, three storylines in particular shocked the hockey world.

Pittsburgh forcing Vegas to take Fleury

Marc-Andre Fleury is coming off one of the worst seasons of his career, but he's still without a doubt a top-30 goaltender. Despite this, Pittsburgh had to offer Vegas a second-round draft pick just so the Golden Knights would take on his contract, which has two years remaining at $5.75 million per season.

The surprising part was that Pittsburgh couldn't find a trade partner for Fleury. Not even Philadelphia or Winnipeg.

Both teams desperately need a goaltender, and while Philadelphia is a division and state rival, Winnipeg would have made sense. If Pittsburgh was willing to give up a 2020 second-rounder to get rid of Fleury's contract, it likely would have taken just about anything in return.

Fleury does have a no-trade clause, allowing him to block a trade to 12 NHL teams. He was willing to waive it for Vegas, but it's unclear if he would have done the same for Philadelphia or Winnipeg.

Otherwise, the Jets either have a lot of faith in Connor Hellebuyck, or didn't want to pay Fleury for two more seasons. Both are questionable reasons, to say the least.

Vegas passing on Matt Dumba

The Golden Knights made a side deal with the Wild to pass on exposed defenseman Matt Dumba. Instead, they ended up with center Erik Haula from the expansion draft and prospect Alex Tuch via trade.

Haula is seemingly a third-line center at best, and Tuch, the 18th overall pick in 2014, is unproven, having played just six NHL games.

Dumba, on the other hand, was the seventh overall pick in 2012, is only 22 years old, has 228 games of NHL experience, is coming off a career year, and is a right-handed-shooting defenseman, which so many teams covet.

Dumba could have been a legitimate top-four defenseman for Vegas to build around. Or, they could have selected him in the expansion draft and then traded him to a team in desperate need of a right-handed-shooting defenseman, such as the Toronto Maple Leafs, and received a package a lot more valuable than Haula and Tuch.

Florida giving up a 30-goal scorer to shed Smith's contract

Reilly Smith's contract is bad. He's owed $5 million per year through the 2021-22 season, and is coming off a campaign in which he only scored 15 goals and registered 37 points.

However, Smith is just 26, and scored 25 goals and added 25 assists the year prior, when Florida wasn't hampered with a number of key injuries.

Nonetheless, Florida was so desperate to move this contract it was willing to give up on a goldmine in Jonathan Marchessault. The 26-year-old scored 30 goals last season and is scheduled to make just $750K next season.

This was a huge win for Vegas.

(Photos courtesy: Getty Images)

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