Pierre Dorion Speaks on the Draft Lottery, New CBA Deal Approaches

It’s official: the Ottawa Senators are picking 3rd and 5th in the 2020 NHL draft. A to-be-determined team will be picking first overall, nobody really understands why, and the mixed reactions have piled in from what was a buzzing Friday evening.

And now... we wait. It’s going to be a while until the NHL draft arrives in the fall, but the rest of the NHL is still moving along with plenty of news from this past week. Here’s the rundown.

• Pierre Dorion spoke to the media immediately after the lottery, and had a handful of interesting quotes. You can listen to the full interview with Jeff Marek and Elliotte Friedman here, talking about the rebuild and giving his pitch for the bright future. Some interesting highlights include mentioning the difficulty of trading out of either of the two spots, plus his enthusiasm for getting a player at 3rd overall who can play in the NHL next year.
• Something that we don’t hear often is good CBA news, and that’s what we got this week with sources saying that a new deal is apparently close to happening. It’s a bit of a surprise in the wake of the NHL already busy negotiating their Return to Play plan, as well as multiple players going public with their complaints of escrow. But it appears the two sides are getting close, with an extension that would likely be around six years in length.
• There’s also been some development on the Return to Play front, as Vancouver officially pulled out as a potential hub city, leaving Edmonton and Toronto as the remaining two options on the Canadian side. The NHL is expected to make their decision sometime next week on the two host cities, although with COVID-19 cases surging in the United States speculation has begun on the potential of them both being located in Canada. Las Vegas, Los Angeles and Chicago are the remaining options in the United States.
• Attention has been placed on the Canadian Hockey League in the past week as former players Daniel Carcillo and Garrett Taylor filed a class-action lawsuit against the league, stating that young players were “sexually and physically assaulted, hazed and otherwise abused while away from home and playing for CHL teams”. You can read the details from the lawsuit here, although a major content warning that it includes no shortage disturbing material. The abhorrent stories have since been corroborated by teammates and more allegations have been added (again major content warning). The CHL responded by forming a panel to address the issues, but it remains to be seen who will be on the panel and if they end up bringing any meaningful change.
• The Toronto Six, the newest expansion franchise of the NWHL, unveiled their jerseys on Friday. The colour scheme may remind you of a certain non-Toronto franchise.../

They're here, and they're perfect.

🔗: https://t.co/PmFr9zk7h5 pic.twitter.com/P04Cpec8Wf

— Toronto Six (@TheTorontoSix) June 26, 2020

• Lastly, coming from Seattle, it was announced that the naming rights to their new arena have been bought by Amazon who are naming it the Climate Pledge Arena. The reactions were mixed, with people voicing their concern over the world’s most valuable company billing themselves on this image despite numerous ethical issues. There was also plenty of positivity around the arena mock-ups which will make it the first carbon neutral arena, equipped with everything from eliminating single-use plastic to electric zambonis. Maybe we’ll see one of these in Ottawa some day *cough*LeBreton*cough*/