The Vegas Golden Knights have traded defenseman Nate Schmidt to the Vancouver Canucks for a third-round draft pick.

Vancouver gets: A speedy rearguard who is pretty solid on the second pairing. He can play secondary PP minutes and secondary PK minutes.

Vegas gets: whatever they could. A third-round pick is low, but they had to be cap compliant (thanks to the Alex Pietrangelo signing) before tomorrow and other teams knew they had them over the barrel.

Fantasy Players Impacted: With Schmidt cleared out now, as expected, the Vegas D will look like this:

Shea Theodore (L)                           Alex Pietrangelo (L)

Alex Martinez (L)                              Brayden McNabb (L)

Nick Holden (L)                                  Zach Whitecloud (R)

Nicolas Hague (L)                             Deryk Engelland (R)

Carl Dahlstrom (L)

Jimmy Schuldt (L)

This brings Hague back onto the roster, but he's still out of the PP mix. Moving Schmidt out will have little impact on the rest of the fantasy relevant defenseman on Vegas.

In Vancouver, the Canucks D look like this:

Quinn Hughes (L)                             Tyler Myers (R)

Alex Edler (L)                                      Nate Schmidt (L)

Jordie Benn (L)                                  Brogan Rafferty (R)

Olli Juolevi (L)

Adding Schmidt makes things a little harder for prospects Rafferty and Juolevi to make the team. Rafferty has a huge edge here because (besides the fact that he's more NHL-ready), he is a right-handed shot. Schmidt will also take PP time away from Myers and Edler, each of whom split second-unit duties. Funny enough, all three of Schmidt, Myers and Edler had exactly seven PPPts last season and played just over a minute of PPTOI per game. Couldn't be more equal there.

The Canucks now boast former Washington Cup winners Schmidt, Braden Holtby and Jay Beagle.

Fantasy Players this helps, in order:

Nicolas Hague slightly

Fantasy Players this hurts, in order:

Tyler Myers

Alex Edler

Olli Juolevi