Ducks Nearing Deal To Acquire Chris Kreider From Rangers

The Ducks and Rangers are in “advanced discussions” on a trade that would send winger Chris Kreider to Anaheim, Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff reports Tuesday. New York is slated to receive a prospect and a pick in return, according to Vince Z. Mercogliano of USA TODAY Sports. The Rangers are not retaining salary on Kreider, who is signed through 2026-27 at a $6.5MM cap hit, if the deal gets across the finish line.

Kreider, 34, has spent the entirety of his 13-year NHL career in New York. They nabbed him 19th overall in the 2009 draft – a solid piece of work considering he’d be a unanimous top-10 choice in a redraft – and has hit the 20-goal mark in 10 of his 12 full seasons with the club.

The 6’3″, 230-lb lefty had been incredibly effective, especially in recent years, as the Rangers exited their accelerated retool during the late 2010s. While always a consistent scoring threat, he erupted for a career-high 52 snipes and 77 points in 81 games in the 2021-22 campaign, leading them in scoring as the Blueshirts had their first 50-win season in seven years and firmly restablished themselves as contenders atop the Eastern Conference.

Kreider hasn’t hit 50 again, nor did anyone expect him to. However, he’s still been incredibly effective as New York’s second-line left-winger behind Artemi Panarin, scoring 75 goals and 129 points in 161 regular-season games across the 2022-23 and 2023-24 seasons, the latter of which resulted in a Presidents’ Trophy for the Rangers. He’s also been downright dominant in the club’s last three playoff appearances, scoring 24 goals in 43 games in the 2022, 2023, and 2024 postseasons.

This season was an obviously disastrous campaign for the Rangers, who missed the playoffs entirely and saw a 29-point drop in the standings. That included Kreider, who had his most injury-plagued season since pre-pandemic. A back injury, hand injury that may have resulted in offseason surgery, and what he later revealed to be a bout of vertigo limited him to 68 games. When healthy, his production cratered. While never a playmaker by any stretch, Kreider still had just eight assists in addition to his 22 goals, giving him 30 points on the year.

That worked out to 0.44 points per game, the worst rate of his career, excluding a 23-game trial in 2012-13. His 0.32 goals per game was far closer to his career median and just a few ticks south of his career average, though. Considering he shot at 14.5%, 0.6% worse than his 15.1% career average, there’s reasonable hope for him to get back to 30 goals again next season for Anaheim, especially if he gels well with a much younger group of centers in Orange County.

More to come…