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With the trade deadline on Monday, teams that are sellers have made it known who is on the table — and the buyers aren’t waiting until Monday to make a move.
The first domino on the trade market fell earlier as the Columbus Blue Jackets traded for Matt Duchene and Julius Bergman and a first round pick from the Ottawa Senators. Also included is a conditional first round pick in 2020 if Duchene re-signs in Columbus. The return for Duchene is reportedly prospects Vitaly Abramov and Jonathan Davidsson.
Duchene, in a fun twist of events, will play tonight for the Blue Jackets, as the Senators are in Ottawa to faceoff against the Blue Jackets tonight. That’s why his message to his now-old club came so quickly:
@Senators pic.twitter.com/dZ5vapeDOY
— Matt Duchene (@Matt9Duchene) February 22, 2019
The impact of this move is that Artemi Panarin is reportedly no longer on the trade market, and the forward was one that the Dallas Stars had been named a dark horse contender to land at the trade deadline. These things can change fast, though, so until the deadline passes, anything is possible.
Hearing Duchene happy to play the role of the rental but as of now no talk about any contract extension between @BlueJacketsNHL and Duchene. Things could change but early indication is Panarin will not be traded in hopes of a long playoff run. https://t.co/3M27ebxz91
— Nick Kypreos (@RealKyper) February 22, 2019
The Blue Jackets are apparently going all-in on a deep playoff run. Could this mean that goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky is no longer available either? Possibly. After all, it wouldn’t make sense to load up and then trade your number one in net....right? After all, both could be traded around the draft for some kind of return instead of walking for nothing on July 1, though the returns will likely be less than they are at the trade deadline.
Now we wait to see where other big potential trade targets go - Dzingel, Stone, Mats Zuccarello, and a few others are expected to have new addresses in the next couple of days.
(But what’s really important in the hockey world is - how does this impact the Toronto Maple Leafs?)