This always felt inevitable, but what wasn’t clear was the timing.
Brady Tkachuk, traded on Sunday from the Ottawa Senators to the Florida Panthers, has two more years left on his contract. If the Senators captain was going to be traded, the summer of 2027 seemed like a likelier window for it. But even as far back as March, when I wrote about the potential for fireworks this summer and listed big names in play, it was clear to me that there was a possibility it would happen this summer.
The Senators didn’t love that I included Tkachuk on that list, and I talked about it with general manager Steve Staios at the GM meetings in Florida a week later.
Deep down, I think he knew even then that this might be a possibility, but I don’t think he was ready yet to embrace that idea.
It became more apparent after the season and especially in recent weeks, as Tkachuk’s agent, Craig Oster of Newport Sports, began having discussions about his client’s future with Staios. That ultimately got to a point where it was communicated that Tkachuk wouldn’t be extending in two years, and the message was clear — Ottawa should get ahead of this, like the Vancouver Canucks did when they got the message from Quinn Hughes that he wasn’t going to be there long-term and sent him to the Minnesota Wild in December.
Why the Senators traded Brady Tkachuk to the Panthers in an NHL blockbuster
Julian McKenzie
That’s as opposed to waiting too long, as the New York Rangers did with Artemi Panarin. Panarin, like Tkachuk, had a no-move clause, and the Rangers were strong-armed into a so-so trade with the Los Angeles Kings.
At the outset of discussions between Staios and the Tkachuk camp, Oster presented a list of four teams Tkachuk would consider in a potential trade: the Wild, the Carolina Hurricanes, the Vegas Golden Knights and, of course, Brady’s brother Matthew’s team, the Panthers.
At no time did Tkachuk promise to waive for all four teams. And that’s an important distinction, because as the process went and as Ottawa talked trades with the four teams, one thing became apparent: This was really just about Tkachuk wanting to be in Florida.
So just as Oster navigated a delicate situation to get Matthew from the Calgary Flames to the Panthers in the summer of 2022, the veteran agent pulled it off again, with Brady joining his brother there.
The smart part of starting with four teams is that, to some level, it forced the Panthers to come up to a certain level in trade talks, knowing that Vegas, Carolina and Minnesota could be there competing.
But let’s also be real. Panthers GM Bill Zito is a pretty smart dude, and he knew he had the hook those other teams didn’t have: Matthew.
So from that context, when this really became about one team, I think the Senators did pretty darn well with the three first-round picks and a second-rounder. Of course, they would have preferred to have Anton Lundell as part of the package, but that was a no-fly zone for the Panthers.
There is a world in which the Senators might have held onto Tkachuk for next season if they hadn’t gotten the deal they wanted, punting the ball down the road on an eventual trade. And my understanding is that Tkachuk understood that possibility and would have come back and been a pro about it. Which is to say, everyone involved knew there were two years left on his deal and it wasn’t a guarantee he got dealt this offseason.
But I think the worry for the Senators was twofold: first, that internally this would have grown bigger and bigger as a distraction, as Tkachuk’s own teammates would likely be aware on some level he wasn’t committed long-term to the team, and that some of those teammates might begrudge him for it — not ideal for dressing room harmony. Second, that Tkachuk’s mindset and demeanor changed after he returned from the Milan Olympics. Tkachuk getting booed in Edmonton and Calgary when he touched the puck in games right after the Olympics did not go unnoticed.
There was certainly a sense of the Team USA factor in all of this and a desire to get out of Canada. I think family discussions have been happening for months between Brady, Matthew and their father, former star Keith Tkachuk.
So from a Senators perspective, delaying the inevitable seemed like a risky proposition. They didn’t want to deal internally with this for another year. And at some point, more of this would have leaked, too, and that would have been a gong show to deal with.
So Ottawa accepted its fate and made lemonade out of lemons with that trade on Father’s Day. The Senators now have more key assets to try to upgrade in the trade market, and that’s their intention to be sure.
Florida, meanwhile, got everyone’s attention earlier Sunday when it acquired the No. 25 pick in Friday’s first round of the draft plus a conditional 2027 second-rounder in exchange for forward Mackie Samoskevich.
Now, because pending UFA Sergei Bobrovsky still hasn’t been re-signed, and because the Panthers are believed to have shown interest in Connor Hellebuyck, their goaltending needs certainly jumped to mind when they made that trade on Sunday morning. But as it turns out, it was to get the final piece of the puzzle to pull off the Brady Tkachuk blockbuster acquisition.
That isn’t to say Florida doesn’t still need to figure out who is going to stop pucks next season. But first things first. Once it became apparent Tkachuk had really made this about one team, Florida went all the way in over the past 48 hours.
The Panthers were already going to be among the favorites next season after finally getting a full offseason to rest their bones and get healthy following three straight trips to the Cup Final and two championships. Adding Brady Tkachuk to the mix? As long as the goaltending is figured out, how is Florida not the favorite in the loaded Atlantic Division next season?
Meanwhile, this is just the beginning league-wide. As one team executive said Sunday night in reaction, “This is going to be a crazy summer.”
As I’ve said before, with so few high-end options on the unrestricted free agent market, trade chatter is at a fever pitch around the league. Tkachuk becoming the latest star player to force his way out of his team is also a trend no one is ignoring.
“We’re becoming the NBA now,” another team executive said on Sunday night.
He wasn’t saying it in a negative way or a positive way — just acknowledging what is happening. More and more star players are taking ownership of their futures. NBA stars for years have been savvy to the business side, not shy in deciding what they want and where they want to play.
It’s arrived in the NHL, it would appear.
Dylan Larkin awaits a resolution after asking for a trade away from the Detroit Red Wings. We’ll see what happens over time with Norris Trophy winner Zach Werenski and the Columbus Blue Jackets. To be clear, he has not asked for a trade, but teams around the league believe that’s coming over the next 12 months. Hellebuyck didn’t hide his feelings about his Winnipeg Jets future at the end of the season. The Dallas Stars are listening on Jason Robertson even as they try to extend him. Per my TSN colleague Darren Dreger, it sounds like Bowen Byram isn’t interested in a long-term marriage with the Buffalo Sabres and could be on the move at some point, too.
And there will be more.
I feel for fans in Ottawa because it’s a franchise that has scar tissue after trading away the likes of Erik Karlsson, Mark Stone and many others over the years. Those were often more financially motivated decisions under the former owner, the late Eugene Melnyk.
What really stings now is that current owner Michael Andlauer is all-in with his team. He’s willing to spend whatever it takes to win. I go back to the sitdown interview I did with him at the Board of Governors meeting in December of 2024, when he accused the New York Rangers of “soft tampering” in their interest in Tkachuk. What came across was Andlauer’s passion for protecting his players. He was fired up that day.
“Here’s my frustration: I talk about how I care for these players, and I care for their families — you make a commitment to a team for six, seven years, you set roots in the community, you’re part of this community, there’s a lot of pressure on these young men,” Andlauer said, speaking about Tkachuk. “Yes, people might say they make millions of dollars, but the reality is there comes a responsibility with that.
“And when I see our captain, in the one year I’ve been here (as Senators owner), there’s been three separate occasions where there’s been fires we had to put out. I can tell you 100 percent there’s never actually been an ounce of discussion about Brady Tkachuk being anything other than an Ottawa Senator.”
That’s why Sunday’s trade had to cut so deep for the Senators owner. He truly believed at that point that his captain was in for the long run in Canada’s capital.
A new reality is setting in — not just for Ottawa, but for a lot of teams around the league that aren’t part of the small group of clubs that so many players covet being part of.
The salary cap, in many ways, evened out the playing field for many years. But with the cap rising in a dramatic way in the next few years, some teams won’t be comfortable spending to the limit. That in itself will create a new gap between teams. And with some star players dictating their futures and some of them wanting to play in that small group of teams everyone desires to be on right now, the playing field is gradually but assuredly becoming the haves and have-nots.
That’s the new reality.
