Liga Privada Year of the Rat Returns Next Week

There will be a 2022 version of the Year of the Rat.

During tonight’s Freestyle Live event, Drew Estate announced the Liga Privada Year of the Rat will return for a 2022 release. The cigar is a 5 1/2 x 46 corona gorda that uses a Connecticut broadleaf wrapper over a Brazilian binder and fillers from Honduras and Nicaragua.

The cigar debuted in 2016 as an exclusive release for the Drew Estate Lounge inside the BB&T Center, home to the National Hockey League’s Florida Panthers, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the team’s only appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals, a season that became known as the Year of the Rat after one such rodent made its way into the Panthers’ locker room, was killed by player Scott Mellanby with his hockey stick, who went onto score three goals that night with that same stick. That led goaltender John Vanbiesbrouck to coin the term “rat trick,” a play on the familiar term hat trick that describes a player scoring three goals in the same game.

It has since returned in 2020 and 2021. The original version came without gold foil, though subsequent versions have used the foil.

Drew Estate no longer discloses the production numbers of limited items. Pricing for the 2022 installment is set at $17.12 per cigar and $171.20 per box of 10 cigars.

Update (May 18, 2022) — Added pricing information after Drew Estate issued a press release about the cigar.