Rules
Reclaiming of players: The 17 existing NHL teams were allowed to reclaim any rights to former WHA players they held. The four incoming franchises, however, were allowed to protect up to two goaltenders and two skaters, voiding their NHL rights. These players were considered "priority selections" in the expansion draft. Numerous deals were cut by the incoming teams to retain some of their players. For instance, Quebec retained star forward Real Cloutier by trading a first round draft choice to the Chicago Black Hawks, which held Cloutier's rights; that pick was used to select perennial superstar Denis Savard.
Wayne Gretzky was a special case as, although no team held his NHL rights, under existing rules he would have been removed from the Oilers and placed into the NHL Entry Draft. After deliberation, the Oilers were allowed to keep Gretzky as one of their priority selections, and were forced to choose last in each round of the 1979 NHL Entry Draft as further compensation. Gordie Howe was a second special case, as a gentlemen's agreement between the Hartford Whalers and the Detroit Red Wings, which held his rights, led to the Wings declining to reclaim Howe.
Expansion draft: Each of the 17 existing NHL teams were allowed to protect 15 skaters and two veteran goalies.
Read more about this topic: 1979 NHL Expansion Draft
Famous quotes containing the word rules:
“Each person calls barbarism whatever is not his or her own practice.... We may call Cannibals barbarians, in respect to the rules of reason, but not in respect to ourselves, who surpass them in every kind of barbarity.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
“... a large portion of success is derived from flexibility. It is all very well to have principles, rules of behavior concerning right and wrong. But it is quite as essential to know when to forget as when to use them.”
—Alice Foote MacDougall (1867–1945)
“... cooking is just like religion. Rules don’t no more make a cook than sermons make a saint.”
—Anonymous, U.S. cook. As quoted in I Dream a World, by Leah Chase, who was quoted in turn by Brian Lanker (1989)