The 2025 NHL draft, which is moving toward a decentralized format, will be held in June at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles, a source confirmed to ESPN.
The draft is scheduled for June 27 and 28 at the venue, which is across from the Crypto.com Arena. Los Angeles Kings. The event was last held in Los Angeles in 2010, when Edmonton Oilers Chosen Taylor Hall First overall.
It will be the NHL’s first decentralized draft, a format used in the NBA, NFL and Major League Baseball in which teams make selections from their own facilities rather than traveling to a central location and making from the draft floor. With the exception of two years during the COVID pandemic, the NHL has hosted the draft at the same location since 1963.
Early plans for a decentralized draft had a high probability of gathering at a medium-sized venue with a few team representatives and league executives. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman will announce each first-round pick and welcome the draftee to the stage.
It’s unclear how public access to the 2025 draft will be facilitated at the Peacock Theater, a source told ESPN.
Bettman has been a supporter of the format change.
“Families are going to be there, prospects are going to be there, we’re all going to be there,” Bettman said at the 2023 NHL Board of Governors meeting in Seattle. “With more people with computers and data involved in the draft and doing that kind of work on the floor, they were all more comfortable in their home environment.”
Utah hockey club general manager Bill Armstrong told ESPN last season that the draft floor isn’t conducive to analysis.
“Drafts are noisy. Telephones don’t work very well either. I think you can be more productive and more accurate when you’re in your room with more information around you,” he said. . “Plus, you’re not worried about exposing your screens to anyone. There’s obviously more privacy.”
A decentralized draft is also more cost-effective. “One of the problems you have with the draft is that it’s a huge expense to move your staff over there, and then to have a lot of your staff go back to development camps,” Armstrong said. falls,” Armstrong said.
The NHL declined to comment. This news was first reported by The Fourth Period.
ESPN’s Ryan S. Clark contributed to this report.