Rumor: Islanders former fourth overall pick retiring

There's a rumor going around online at the moment that former New York Islanders prospect Griffin Reinhart is retiring. Reinhart spent the 21-22 season in the EIHL with the Belfast Giants.

He scored 32 points in 53 games for the Giants who topped the league with 88 points earning them back-to-back league championships.

New York Islanders: Griffin Reinhart rumored to be retiring

Retiring is certainly a bit of a surprise. Reinhart is after all only 28 years old. But it's safe to say his hockey career hasn't gone according to the script since the 2012 draft.

Selected fourth overall by the Islanders in 2012, Reinhart was supposed to be a big part of the Islanders rebuild. In the five drafts from 2008 through 2012 that the Islanders selected four top 5 picks and a top ten player.

2008: Josh Bailey (C/LW) 9th overall
2009: John Tavares (C) 1st overall
2010: Nino Niedereiter (RW) 5th overall
2011: Ryan Strome (C) 5th overall
2012: Griffin Reinhart (D) 4th overall

As we know, he wasn't a big part of the rebuild. Heck, few were really. Tavares and to an extent Josh Bailey were the only big part of the rebuild. For Reinhart, things didn't go well at the NHL level. He couldn't really break into the Islanders squad and was eventually dealt to the Edmonton Oilers in 2015 for a first and second-round pick.

Those two picks would effectively became Mathew Barzal and Anthony Beauvillier*.

*Garth Snow packaged that second from Edmonton and another second to move up to 28th overall where he'd select Beauvillier.

After being traded, Reinhart bounced from Edmonton to Vegas (selected at the expansion draft) but played mainly in the AHL. He'd play 281 games at the AHL level between the Chicago Wolves, Bakersfield Condors, and Bridgeport Sound Tigers.

In 2019-20, Reinhart took his career outside of North America, joining the Kunlun Red Star of the KHL. He then had a single-season stop in German for the Isenhorn Roosters before his single-season stint with the Belfast Giants.

So again, his career hasn't gone as he (or any of us) had thought it would when he was drafted fourth overall. That could be why he might be handing them up. If that's true, congrats to him on still having a decent hockey career.