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Say it out loud and it sounds daft. If you are 18 or 19 and were drafted from a team like the Vancouver Giants, you can’t go and play pro hockey at any level outside of the NHL for two years.

This arrangement is due to a nearly four-decades-old deal between the NHL and Canadian Hockey League — the organization that governs this country’s three major junior leagues.

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The purpose of the deal is to raise the prestige of Canadian major junior hockey, by prohibiting Canadian and American players drafted from a CHL club from playing in the AHL, the NHL’s primary professional development league, until they’re in their age-20 season.

In the short term, it may marginally raise the quality of CHL games, and in theory help pull in more fans to major junior stands, something owners in those leagues like.

But it doesn’t do anything in the long run for the player — and that’s without getting into how it’s an anti-worker policy, one that keeps young Canadians from earning a wage, unlike their European peers.