1. In the last expansion draft (2000), each existing team could protect nine forwards, five defensemen, and one goalie (or two goalies and ten skaters). In the 2017 draft each team could only protect seven forwards, three defensemen and one goalie (or one goalie and eight skaters regardless of position).
2. First-year and second-year players did not have to be protected, but each team was required to expose at least two forwards and one defenseman who played 40+ games in 2016-2017 or 70+ games in 2015-16 and 2016-17 combined.
3. The 2017 expansion draft only involved one expansion team, so the Knights could pick any of these players.
4. In each succeeding expansion draft the number of teams grows. So not only did the number of protected players shrink compared to previous expansion drafts, but the total draft pool was very large. There were 30 existing NHL teams that had to expose players in this draft.
5. Teams had to protect players with no-trade clauses. These usually tend to be older players with long-term deals that an existing team would love to get off their hands. Chicago was probably screwed worse than anyone else in this regard. Eight of their eleven players were protected because the team had no choice about it, including one player (Marian Hossa) who had to be protected even though he already announced he was going to miss the 2017-18 season for medical reasons and has since been classified as a "long-term injured reserve" player after he decided that he won't play anymore but will remain under contract through 2020-21.
6. The salary cap gave other teams big incentives to cut deals with Las Vegas even before the draft started. LV didn't just draft Marc-Andre Fleury because they thought he was the best goalie available. Pittsburgh gave up a second round pick in 2020 for LV to take him off their hands. LV made more than a dozen deals like this, and ended up getting at least nine additional draft picks in the next 2-3 years from teams who used this approach to get specific players off their rosters.
One problem I really have with the 2017 expansion draft was that the rules were established at a time when the NHL thought they'd be adding two teams (Quebec City was the second one). The NHL deferred a decision on Quebec and left the rules in place with just one expansion team getting first dibs on all of the exposed players.
The no other team thing certainly played to LV’s advantage. But other than that it’s deck chairs. The protection list is basically the same. 2 more teams to pull from doesn’t really change things, especially not with a 20 man roster.
No trade clauses are generally a bad idea. It’s good that the league made teams use their protection on them. You signed them on to stay, keep em.
As for the deals that was LV being smart. It’s not like previous teams didn’t have players under bad contracts they were hoping to get rid of.
The biggest advantage they had was new ways of analyzing talent. There’s a lot more numbers available to teams now, a lot less pure eyeballing. I know the old guard hate advanced analytics in all sports, but those numbers have meaning. You still need to know what you’re looking for but the data is there. Their line 1 forwards have combined to be on 11 teams, most of their players have bounced around the league, lots of near league minimum contracts. These were not high value players. But they were the right players to play together and the right players for the coach’s system. They drafted and traded smart. They built for success, not as much as they’re having, but they definitely weren’t going at it just hoping to not suck like most expansion teams. They executed a good plan well.