After what seemed like years of Jakob Chychrun leading the trade bait boards, the Arizona Coyotes finally dealt the defenseman on Wednesday to the Ottawa Senators. While the original asking price for the 24 year old blue liner was too steep for Sens GM Pierre Dorion, as the deadline approached the majority of teams in need of defensive help made deals, allowing Dorion to circle back to Coyotes GM Bill Armstrong and finalizing a much more reasonable deal.
The Sens are sending their 2023 1st round pick (top 5 protected), a conditional 2nd round pick in 2024 (from Washington) and a 2nd round pick in 2026 for Chychrun. This is a long ways removed from Armstrong’s original asking price of 3 pieces, with some combination of 1st round picks, high level prospects or young NHL ready talent. The Coyotes have to be disappointed with the return for their best trade chip, especially after comparing the return for players like Hronek (1st and 2nd round picks) and Ekholm (1st round pick and 1st round prospect). The return is also similar to what the Florida Panthers gave up last season for a rental in Ben Chiarot.
A former 16th overall pick in the 2016 draft, Chychrun signed a 6 year extension with the Coyotes in 2019 with a more than reasonable $4.6 million dollar cap hit that will have him in Ottawa through the 2024-25 season. The 6’2 220lb rearguard has yet to play a full 82 game season in his career, and has missed a large part of this season, partly due to injury, and partly due to the Coyotes holding him out of the lineup for trade protection purposes, but has impressed GMs across the league when he was active.
He has 7 goals and 28 points through 36 games this season, while logging 23 minutes a night. Over his 7 season career, Chychrun has played in 373 games, netting 60 goals and 110 assists, for 170 points on several poor Coyotes teams.
Trade alert! The #Sens have acquired defenceman Jakob Chychrun from @ArizonaCoyotes in exchange for a conditional first-round draft pick in ’23, a conditional second-round selection in ’24 (previously acquired from @Capitals) and a second-round pick in ’26. 1/2 pic.twitter.com/toPp9uDS3n
— Ottawa Senators (@Senators) March 1, 2023
With veteran forward Derrick Brassard stating publicly on Monday that he thought the team had played well enough to have earned the right to be buyers at the deadline after looking like potential sellers, the Ottawa Senators officially reentered the market after the team swept back to back games against the Detroit Red Wings, one of the 5 teams they were chasing to sneak into a playoff spot.
Dorion’s hunt for a top 4 defenseman has been one of the worst kept secrets in the NHL. Although he would have preferred to find a right shot defenseman to pair with Jake Sanderson, Chychrun’s age, skill and team friendly contract, coupled with the lowered asking price, made the deal too good to pass up.
“A defenseman we’ve coveted, Jakob is big and plays imposing,” Senators GM Pierre Dorion said in a team-released statement. “He possesses a quality skill set; he defends hard and is highly skilled. He uses his heavy shot with accuracy and is effective at creating offense as a threat at the offensive blue line.”
The deal is a sign of the organization’s trust in the young Senators squad led by captain Brady Tkachuk and the dynamic Tim Stutzle. While making the playoffs this season is still a long shot due to a disappointing stretch throughout the month of November, the team has bounced back nicely in the new year. With their defensive core now set for 2023 they look like a real threat to vie for a Wildcard spot this year, and be treated as a dark horse contender in 2023-24.
-Devon Gallant
Twitter: @DevGallant
Photo: Pens Through My Lens. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.