Vegas Golden Knights general manager Kelly McCrimmon has dismissed criticism that he's exploited the NHL's long-term injured reserve system to bolster his team heading into the playoffs.
"Google 'lacerated spleen' and see if you can tell when a player is going to be back," he told "The Jeff Marek Show," referring to the ailment that's sidelined captain Mark Stone since late February. "It's ridiculous to suggest that these weren't significant injuries or aren't significant injuries.
"Furthermore, the National Hockey League polices all of this. The rules are the rules, the NHL watches this very carefully."
Stone has been ruled out for the remainder of the regular season. With the veteran forward and his $9.5-million cap hit on LTIR, Vegas was able to make the biggest splash at this year's deadline by picking up Anthony Mantha, Noah Hanifin, and Tomas Hertl.
However, Stone's postseason status is uncertain. The Golden Knights could activate him without issue since the salary cap doesn't apply in the playoffs.
The situation is similar to what happened last campaign. Vegas made some big deadline acquisitions after Stone's regular season ended in January due to a back injury, although he went on to appear in all of the Golden Knights' postseason games.
"Last year ... we acquired Ivan Barbashev, Jonathan Quick, and Teddy Blueger (at the deadline)," McCrimmon said. "I would suggest to you we probably could have acquired all three players without Mark Stone's LTIR. This year, it happened that there were opportunities available to use that space, so that's what we did.
"The flip side is to have $9.5 million of LTIR space as a general manager and sit on your hands, and I don't think that's doing our job the way that we should."
McCrimmon maintains that his organization hasn't done anything outside of what's allowed in the collective bargaining agreement.
"LTIR is collectively bargained between the Players' Association and the NHL," he said. "The idea behind it is, if you have a player suffer a significant injury, you can replace that player. Obviously from there, it's the timing of injuries."
The reigning Stanley Cup champions currently occupy the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference with a 34-23-7 record. They've lost nine out of their last 12 games.
