Ask Josh: Will Vegas select Fleury in the expansion draft?

Las Vegas won't be able to pick from the protected players but they'll be taking one unprotected player from each team. The Penguins instead protected Matt Murray a week after the second-year goalie led them to win their second consecutive championship. On the final year of his deal with a digestible $5 million USA cap hit, an established 20-plus goal scorer like Neal, 29, would fit the bill.

SURE BET: Assuming Anaheim has already worked out a trade to keep Vegas away from Sami Vatanen and Josh Manson - perhaps at the cost of a first-round pick - there are still plenty of young, affordable defensemen to choose from along with some veterans. The fifth-year player, however, won't be ready for the start of the season after having surgery to fix a shoulder injury. Ottawa Senators right wing Bobby Ryan, Nashville Predators' winger James Neal, New York Islanders centre Brock Nelson and Columbus Blue Jackets left wing Josh Anderson are among the noteworthy forwards. Vegas could look at Boston's Colin Miller (24), Edmonton's Griffin Reinhart (23) and Buffalo's Zach Bogosian (26).

Other Bruins players available to Vegas are forwards Matt Beleskey, Jimmy Hayes, Dominic Moore, Drew Stafford, Brian Ferlin, Alex Khokhlachev, Tyler Randell and Zac Rinaldo; defensemen John-Michael Liles, Joe Morrow, Linus Arnesson, Chris Casto, Tommy Cross and Alex Grant; and goalie Anton Khudobin. The protection lists have been submitted, and the Golden Knights are in their 72-hour window of exclusive free agent negotiation. By actually giving the Golden Knights a shot at getting legitimate NHL players, the league has created a buzz around expansion the likes of which it has never seen before.

George McPhee can't wait to fill up the white board, the one in the Vegas Golden Knights' expansion draft room.

Fleury is very likely to be selected by the Las Vegas Knights because he has proven many times that he can be a top-flight goaltender. That suggests an understanding of the Knights' mediocrity in the early going and the need for as many potential draft picks and prospects as possible.

Those deals won't be formally revealed until Wednesday. It's hard to say for certain but the outlook seems to be that McPhee has a ton of control of this situation and that he alone will set the market for teams making these sorts of deals.

"Every team in this league has a chance to protect their roster", he said.

At least 20 players must be under contract for the coming season. He's got one year left on his deal with a modest $1 million U.S. cap hit. "It would be, 'Do we have too many players?' There are a lot of good players there". There's also a surplus of young goaltending talent, including Detroit's Petr Mrazek, Washington's Philipp Grubauer, the Rangers' Raanta and Colorado's Calvin Pickard.

The former Capitals GM also previously signed Washington defenseman Nate Schmidt out of college and Sharks right winger Joel Ward in free agency and traded for Flames right winger Troy Brouwer.

The league and NHL Players' Association announced the cap and the salary floor of $55.4 million in a joint statement Sunday.

ROLLING THE DICE: Pending free agent Kevin Shattenkirk of the Capitals wants to be a No. 1 defenseman and could get that role in Vegas. Little wonder the Ducks would like to work out a deal with the Knights to keep him.

Chayka was exaggerating, but only slightly.

Since the expansion draft started Sunday morning, McPhee has been negotiating with teams that want to protest exposed players.

That doesn't mean the other GMs can't talk.

But Vegas general manager George McPhee has a simple solution for those teams that don't want to part with their star players.