Manninen is a product of Karpat Oulu's academy, but he was not a standout during junior years. He went undrafted and only entered Finnish top flight Liiga properly at 22.
He came to prominence after moving from Karpat to HPK within the league before moving to the KHL, first with Finnish side Jokerit Helsinki and then spending three years in Ufa. He had back to back 19 goal seasons with the Russian team.
Fans will remember him as being a key part of Jukka Jalonen's national team, with which he won the IIHF World Championship in 2019 and 2022, scoring the gold medal clinching goal at the latter. He was also a part of the Finnish national team when they beat 'the Olympic Athletes from Russia' in the Winter Olympics finals to claim another gold medal.
At 30 years of age and after plenty of success in Europe, Manninen is finally set to move overseas. With Vegas tightly fitting within the cap space and losing prolific goalscorer Max Pacioretty (33) for virtually nothing, the Finnish forward should have plenty of opportunities to make his name in hockey's biggest league.