The Top 6 Landing Spots for Flames Winger Matthew Tkachuk

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You might want to check on any friends who are Calgary Flames fans.

It’s not been the best few days in southern Alberta.

Less than a week after winger Johnny Gaudreau spurned the organization’s eight-year contract offer to take less term and less money in Columbus, the long-range status of fellow star Matthew Tkachuk is in question after the team filed for salary arbitration.

The Flames said the move enabled them to work with Tkachuk’s representatives toward a contractual resolution while removing the possibility of another team signing the restricted free agent to an offer sheet. He’s made $7 million annually for the last three seasons—in which he’s produced 81 goals and 208 points—and is due a $9 million qualifying offer.

Arbitration hearings run from July 27 through Aug. 11, and if Tkachuk goes through the process he won’t be able to negotiate a contract extension until Jan. 1, at which point he’d be a half-season closer to unrestricted free agency.

That’s a risk Calgary general manager Brad Treliving isn’t likely to take after losing Gaudreau for nothing, so it’s more likely he tries to work on a trade for the 6’2″, 202-pounder who was born in Arizona while his father, 18-year NHLer Keith Tkachuk, was playing for the Coyotes.

Given that opening, the B/R hockey team got together to discuss Tkachuk’s future and compile a list of the places he’s most likely to wind up if Treliving works out a deal.

Scroll through to see what we came up with and drop a thought of two of your own in the comments to let us know how we did.

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Look away, Flames fans.

While it’s bad enough to ponder the idea of Tkachuk playing in another uniform next season, it’s likely even more difficult to comprehend the possibility of him going to a division rival.

While the Edmonton Oilers would be the ultimate doomsday scenario in the Pacific, it wouldn’t be a picnic to see Tkachuk pulling on his No. 19 with the Anaheim Ducks.

Coach Dallas Eakins’ team was among the league’s best through the first few months of the 2021-22 season before plummeting in the back half and ultimately missing the playoffs.

Still, the Ducks are loaded with enough cap space and farm system talent to accommodate a trade and the 24-year-old’s subsequent salary demands, and their forwards corps are loaded with young skilled players like Trevor Zegras to make it worth Tkachuk’s while.

One thing’s for sure: Four times a year, it’d be a must-watch game on the NHL schedule.

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If nothing else, the New Jersey Devils are making an effort.

The franchise hasn’t made the playoffs in four straight seasons, nine of the last 10 overall and hasn’t won a series since a losing trip to the Stanley Cup Final in 2011-12.

GM Tom Fitzgerald has been stockpiling high draft picks—including recent No. 1s Nico Hischier (2017) and Jack Hughes (2019)—and he took a swing for the free-agency fences last summer by inking defenseman Dougie Hamilton to a seven-year deal worth $63 million.

The Devils limped to a seventh-place finish in the eight-team Metropolitan Division, but Fitzgerald’s certainly not done, as evidenced by a trade that acquired goalie Vitek Vanecek from Washington and a five-year free-agent contract that lured Ondrej Palat from Tampa Bay.

More than $9.5 million in cap space still remains after the early summertime work, which means Fitzgerald could put something together that’d entice Treliving to send Tkachuk to the East Coast and out of his divisional and conference nightmares.

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The Islanders have been a curious free-agency case this summer.

Not for the moves they’ve made, but rather for the moves they haven’t made.

Still, while nothing has registered on the Richter scale so far, New York GM Lou Lamoriello has more than $11 million in cap space to work with, and it’d certainly fit his long-range character to make a seismic late-stage move to grab leaguewide attention.

The Islanders were in the running for Gaudreau and made an offer before he wound up with the Blue Jackets, and they certainly could use a 42-goal, 104-point producer like Tkachuk to jolt an offense that tied for 22nd in goals scored last season.

Tkachuk’s 12 power-play goals were tops by two on the Flames last season and would’ve also slotted in at the top spot ahead of Brock Nelson’s 11 for the Islanders, whose team output with a man-advantage (22.1 percent) was 12th in the league.

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Here’s one where the math will have to be worked out.

The Rangers have just less than $5 million in available cap space, which certainly isn’t enough to get Tkachuk in the fold on its own. But they’ve got a pretty strong complement of young talent on the NHL and AHL level, so a trade could work if GM Chris Drury is into it.

Because he’s an aggressive, abrasive player with a scoring touch, it’s no mystery why Drury would be interested in putting him in New York’s top six.

The problem is that doing so would displace one of the resident wingers already in the pipeline.

Conveniently enough, 21-year-old Kaapo Kakko is a restricted free agent after being selected second overall in 2019 and Vitali Kravtsov is eager for a change of scenery following three years of spun wheels with the organization since going ninth overall in 2018.

Shuttling them to the Great White North (and some others to balance the books) would give Treliving hope for the future while giving Drury another piece in the Stanley Cup puzzle.

Start spreading the news.

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Forget anything you’ve read to the contrary:

The Ottawa Senators have won the NHL offseason.

The residents of Canada’s capital city got 40-goal scorer Alex DeBrincat from Chicago and goalie Cam Talbot from Minnesota on draft day, then struck gold on Day 1 of free agency by luring veteran Claude Giroux after his fruitless springtime Cup chase in metropolitan Miami.

The new offensive pieces will be added to the existing 87-goal trio of Josh Norris, Tim Stutzle and Brady Tkachuk. And yes, if the surname of that last guy sounds familiar, it should.

Brady is Matthew’s 22-year-old brother and put up career-bests with 30 goals and 67 points last season and it’s not a stretch to suggest the paired-up siblings could provide a particularly prolific and gritty element to the Ottawa top six.

The Senators have seven picks across the first two rounds of the next three drafts and better than $11 million in cap space, and adding another Tkachuk could almost guarantee the end of a five-season playoff drought that stretches back a 2016-17 conference final run.

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Last but not least, it’s time to go home.

OK, Tkachuk was actually born in Arizona because his dad was playing there at the time.

But Keith Thachuk was sent to St. Louis for three players and a draft pick at the 2001 trade deadline and played nine seasons across two stints there while checking off several milestone boxes—including his 500th career goal and the last of his 1,201 career games.

So it’s not crazy that Tkachuk considers it “home” and it’s equally not crazy to suggest he’d want to follow in his father’s prolific footsteps there.

Given those realities, it’s realistic to think Treliving would have his eyes on a guy like 30-year-old winger Vladimir Tarasenko, who’s got one year remaining on a $7.5 million annual deal and has made it known he’d like to leave the Blues.

Or if the Calgary boss wants to veer younger, he may covet 24-year-old winger Jordan Kyrou, who’s coming off 75 points in 74 games and has a year before restricted free agency; or defenseman Colton Parayko, who’s 29 and signed through 2029-30 at $6.5 million per.

Assemble a package with two of the three and Tkachuk’s mail could be re-routed.