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Recent news announced regarding the National Hockey League’s Entry Draft in June 2026 has left fans across social media quite disappointed and angry.
The National Hockey League’s Entry Draft used to be a marquee event for fans of all teams, who like those they support, would gather at the host arena to watch the future of their respective franchises get selected.
This year was much different as the league decided to go with a de-centralized format allowing all teams to remain in their home city, while only about 50 or so prospects were in attendance hoping to hear their name called by Gary Bettman or a celebrity guest.
Night one of the draft didn’t go as well as fans were expecting, from awkward technical issues to a run time of nearly four-and-a-half hours, everyone was hoping that the league would return to a centralized format in 2026, but it doesn’t look like that’ll be the case.
NHL General Managers vote to keep de-centralized draft format
On Thursday, Cam Robinson of Elite Prospects reported that he was hearing a vote among NHL General Managers was trending towards another de-centralized draft next June.
“NHL GMs have now voted on re-centralizing the Draft.
While the league has yet to alert teams to the final results, it appears the majority have voted to keep it decentralized.
If that holds, what a miss.” Robinson said.
Less than 48 hours later, TSN hockey insider Darren Dreger confirmed on social media that the league will be sticking with their de-centralized format for 2026 and are currently looking at ways to speed up the first round.
“Reporting on this only because I’m a bit surprised by the outcome. Expect the NHL to give the Decentralized Draft model another try next year. Strong majority of GM’s voted in favour of the new status quo with some potential production tweaks to move the 1st round along.” Dreger said.
As expected, fans didn’t take the news too well, with some on social media going as far as saying they don’t plan on watching the 2026 NHL Entry Draft at all if this decision holds.
“If this passes I will not be watching it…will get summary online. It was truly boring like all other sports drafts that I won’t watch. NHL draft use to be unique & fun to watch. Leave it to the NHL to screw up something that made them cool. Interaction of GMs was interesting👎” @LeafsLoyalty said.
“This is one of our favorite things to watch, the NHL Draft. This is a puzzling decision considering how hard it was to watch this year. No thanks.” @mnwprospects said.
From a business point of view, it’s understandable as to why they’ve decided to remain with their de-centralized format, however, sports are an entertainment business and without fans, many of these league’s would be in a tough spot.
For the NHL, the Entry Draft each year was a date that fans looked forward to each year and with this latest decision to remain de-centralized, they’ll have to deal with & understand why they’re dealing with backlash and hopefully in 2027, they’ll return to the old format.
Previously on CanucksDaily