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Fresh takes on the Canucks’ reported 2C trade route
Source: https://canucksarmy.com/news/fresh-takes-vancouver-canucks-reported-2c-trade-route
Same as it ever was? Same as it ever was.
Whatever the actual level of interest the Vancouver Canucks ever had in UFA Jack Roslovic, their ‘pursuit’ may be at an end. Earlier this week, Thomas Drance of The Athletic reported that the Canucks had “cooled off” on Roslovic. Drance further elaborated that the “club wants a full-time centre upgrade, and doesn’t see that player available in the UFA bargain bin. It’s going to take a trade.”
Hearing the #Canucks have cooled off on pursuing late summer UFA Jack Roslovic.
Club wants a full-time centre upgrade, and doesn’t see that player available in the UFA bargain bin. It’s going to take a trade.
More in today’s notebook via @TheAthleticNHL: https://t.co/kqRo1ijb8e
— Thomas Drance (@ThomasDrance) August 19, 2025
Now, some will question how news-y this news truly is. The fact of the matter is that this year’s UFA market never really contained much in the way of realistic centre options for the Canucks, and one would hope it didn’t take them until mid-August to figure that out.
If there’s one piece here that’s definitely not new news, it’s that ongoing hunt for a 2C via trade. In fact, this topic is so ongoing that it’s become a bit tough to write about. After all, the list of potentially available centres hasn’t changed much over the course of the offseason, and the Canucks would appear to have not gotten all that much closer to trading for one.
With that in mind, and the knowledge that we’re mostly discussing names we’ve already talked about before on here, our goal today is to at least deliver some fresh takes on those same ol’ trade targets. Below, you’ll find various 2C options sorted into some new categories, along with some updated commentary on the likelihood of the Canucks actively pursuing said player.
The RFAs You’re Sick of Hearing About
We have to talk about these two, but we acknowledge that we’ve already talked about them plenty.
Marco Rossi, Minnesota Wild
Extension negotiations between Rossi and the Wild were said to be a little acrimonious right off the bat due to Rossi’s playoff deployment, and the fact that they’re still ongoing in August probably speaks to that.
There’s still time to figure it out. But if the Wild front office is examining their various options, we have to imagine they’d prefer a trade offer over an offer sheet. With an offer sheet, the return can only be future draft picks. But Minnesota is trying to capitalize on the prime years of their top offensive talent, Kirill Kaprizov. If a team could offer them more NHL-ready assets – or a mix of NHL-ready and future-based – one has to think that’s more appealing to Bill Guerin and Co.
The Canucks could offer up a currently-useful forward, like Filip Chytil (whose salary would probably need to be moved in order to accommodate Rossi’s new contract, anyway), along with their 2026 first-round pick – so long as appropriate protections were put in place. That may not be enough to close the deal, but maybe as the talks drag on, the asking price might drop a tad.
Mason McTavish, Anaheim Ducks
Alright, you can take most of what we wrote about Rossi and apply it to McTavish. The key difference is that the Ducks aren’t at quite the same competitive stage as are the Wild. They might not be so focused on currently-usable assets. Then again, the Ducks would seem to have largely completed the important parts of their rebuild, and are now making the slow climb back to the playoffs.
Between the two, McTavish does seem like the one who will be tougher to acquire. He’s got more intangible qualities, and the Ducks have a lot more cap space with which to operate. Still, until that extension gets signed, it remains a remote possibility that cannot be discounted.
The Centres from Cap-Cutting Clubs
Despite the cap ceiling jumping up this offseason, there are still teams who want or need to cut cap before the season begins. And some of them might have centres for sale.
William Karlsson, Vegas Golden Knights
Technically-speaking, the Knights are already some $7.5 million over the salary cap. The reality, however, is that they’ll be able to cover that entirely by placing Alex Pietrangelo and his $8.8 million cap hit on LTIR, a status from which he is not expected to return.
Still, doing so would leave Vegas at their absolute maximum for spending very early on in the season, and they’re a club that traditionally loves to make in-season upgrades – especially now that they’re down a top defender.
In looking at their roster, the Knights are honestly a little overloaded on quality centres. Tomas Hertl might make the most sense to move for cap reasons, but he’s got an especially restrictive no-trade clause. Karlsson is an original Golden Knight, but that doesn’t seem to matter much to Vegas management, and he would be much easier for them to move.
Nicolas Roy, Toronto Maple Leafs
The Maple Leafs are about $2 million under the cap, so they don’t need to cut salary, but the word on the street is that their interest in Roslovic has not cooled, and that they’re still attempting to cut cap in order to fit him.
This will likely be accomplished by the dumping of an expensive fourth liner like David Kampf or Calle Jarnkrok. But if the Maple Leafs want to get a little bit of value back in their cap dump, another option is Roy.
Roy came back from the Golden Knights as part of the ‘return’ for Mitch Marner, but at that point they had to take something. It’s tough to say how much Roy is actually in their plans, and they do have some other options available at centre.
Combine the cap-cutting with the extraneousness, and Roy might wind up being a relatively buy-low option.
Ross Colton, Colorado Avalanche
The Avalanche just signed Victor Olofsson to a contract, and his $1.575 million contract leaves them just just over $1.3 million of available cap space. It also leaves them with an excess of bottom-six forwards.
Of the set, the best is probably Colton, but he’s also the most expensive at a $4 million cap hit. We suspect it might not cost that much to pry him loose, and there’s been talk in the past of Colton specifically seeking a trade out of Colorado so that he’d have more of a chance to play centre.
Well, we know where he could get that chance!
Evan Rodrigues, Florida Panthers
The Panthers are almost $4 million over the cap, and unlike some of the other teams mentioned here, they don’t have an easy way to get back under. Chances are good that Matthew Tkachuk will start the season on LTIR, but that’s only a temporary solution, as he will return at some point.
The name most associated with Florida cost-cutting is Rodrigues, a versatile forward who can play all three forward positions. Given his recent playoff performances, there’s probably a decent-sized market for him, so some sort of bidding war may ensue – though we like the odds of the Panthers preferring to send Rodrigues to the West.
The Unexpected Revisits
This is a collection of names that the Canucks have reportedly been interested in before – and could now be circling back on.
Martin Necas, Colorado Avalanche
We know the Canucks were interested in Necas back when he was a Hurricane and Elias Pettersson trade talks were ongoing.
We also know that the Avalanche are all-too-happy to trade their pending UFAs if extension talks aren’t going well.
Necas enters this season as a pending UFA. Should the Avs decide to flip him instead of re-signing him, the Canucks will probably show interest again – even if it’s yet to be determined if Necas if a full-time centre in the NHL.
The challenge here would be both coming up with the assets required – Chytil and a first won’t cover this – and then finding the cap space to extend Necas beyond this year. Neither will be easy tasks.
Josh Norris, Buffalo Sabres
We’ve written plenty about Quinn Hughes’ best friend before.
For now, he seems to be part of the plan in Buffalo. But if the Sabres get off to another bad start, they’ve almost got to clean their managerial house – and if a new GM comes in, he might not feel as committed to Norris’ $7.95 million cap hit and extensive injury history.
It’d take some waiting, but if Norris were to hit the market at a reduced cost, it’d be hard for the Canucks to not at least want to kick the tires – especially with that Hughes extension still pending.
Jared McCann, Seattle Kraken
It’s often tough to guess what the Kraken are really doing. They don’t need cap space, they need additional talent, but there’s still some word on the street about McCann being available. One could assume this has something to do with the team slowly-but-surely shifting to a focus around young centres Matthew Beniers and Shane Wright, in addition to the bounty of recent draft picks on the way. Maybe the team is looking to sell McCann one year before he’s a pending UFA, and to use the trade to recoup some longer-term assets.
If there’s any lingering bad blood between McCann and the club that gave up on him, one has to hope it’s faded by now. The Canucks aren’t going to find much better bang-for-buck in a top-six centre than McCann at $5 million, so long as the Kraken don’t instill too heavy of a rivalry tax on the trade cost.
Jesperi Kotkaniemi, Carolina Hurricanes
With more than $10 million in cap space and an already-contending roster, the Hurricanes are probably good to stand pat for now. But we will note that this is the last year before Kotkaniemi receives a ten-team no-trade clause. If the Hurricanes are looking to move on easily, and the Canucks are still somewhat interested, maybe there’s something there.
Pavel Zacha, Boston Bruins
We’re cheating a little on this one, because there have never been any concrete rumours of the Canucks’ interest in Zacha, just various whispers – both when he was on the Devils, and since he’s arrived in Boston. There have also been very recent talk of the Bruins putting Zacha on the market in this late offseason, which has our ears perked up.
James Murphy: "Trade rumors continue to surround the Boston Bruins, with Joonas Korpisalo and Pavel Zacha's names consistently coming up" – RG (8/10)
— NHL Rumour Report (@NHLRumourReport) August 10, 2025
At the very least, we know that this Vancouver front office has been very comfortable pilfering from the Boston system before…
From Out Of Left Field
Rickard Rakell, Pittsburgh Penguins
Rakell has mostly been a winger of late, but he’s reportedly able to play all three forward positions. And if that’s the case, he looks like a decently-priced and unusually-productive option – though one can’t count on him repeating the 70 points he achieved last year.
There’s some uncertainty in whether or not the 32-year-old is still up to top-six centre duties, however, and it would be quite a gamble to acquire him for that specific duty.
Nazem Kadri, Calgary Flames
Kadri is one of those rare players who just seems to get better with age. Still, if the Flames were smart, they’d be selling high on his 35-goal season instead of trying to build a playoff roster around he and Jonathan Huberdeau.
One imagines that Kadri would also like to move on to a more competitive team. And, hey, maybe that’s not the Canucks. But he does appear to enjoy playing in Canada, so if he can come to Vancouver and be a ‘missing piece,’ maybe that has an appeal.
In any case, with a full NMC, any destination will be of Kadri’s choosing.
Casey Mittelstadt, Boston Bruins
Don’t jump on us right away. One of the mental exercises we engaged in while writing this article was to look out at various league rosters and think “Who do we not want the Canucks to acquire, but could still see them trading for?” And the answer is Mittelstadt.
If the Bruins are considering trading Zacha, one has to think they’d prefer to move Mittelstadt first. He’s coming off a poor showing and makes $5.75 million a year.
From a Canucks’ perspective, Mittelstadt looks like a lot of what they already have and very little of what they would seem to need. We don’t want this to happen, we just wouldn’t be entirely shocked if it did.
Kirby Dach, Montreal Canadiens
Technically, the Canadiens could have made our ‘cap-cutting’ list, as they’re almost $6 million over the cap – but that will be rectified by either trading Carey Price’s contract or putting it on LTIR.
The more immediate pressure for the Canadiens is on roster space. They’ve got a plethora of young forwards looking to burst through, and other interesting names around the fringes, like former Abbotsford Canuck Sammy Blais.
If Dach’s latest injury trouble results in him having a slow start to the season, or even a poor training camp, he could become available very quickly. And if it’s for relatively cheap, the Canucks could definitely stand to take a flyer on a 6’4” former third overall pick.
Michael Rasmussen, Detroit Red Wings
He’s big, he’s from BC, and he’s getting pushed out of the picture by younger Detroit forwards. The only issue here is that the odds of Rasmussen developing into a true top-six forward at age 26 – and with a career high of 33 points – seem slim.
Then again, bigger bodies tend to take longer to develop, and Rasmussen is 6’6”. This could be one of the more intriguing buy-low options on the market, if he’s truly on the market.
Mika Zibanejad, New York Rangers
One last really out-there one for the road.
There was plenty of talk of Zibanejad being involved in a JT Miller trade last year, but that didn’t happen. The indications have always seemed to be that Zibanejad, who has a full NMC, simply prefers to stay in NYC.
That said, if there were any other destination that worked for Zibanejad, Vancouver would presumably be it. There are plenty of other Swedes there already, and a thriving local arts scene for the would-be DJ.
Given Zibanejad’s inconsistent performance and high salary, there’s even the chance that the Rangers would be ‘selling low’ on him, just to get that cap hit off the books in the long-term. The trouble for the Canucks would be in finding that same cap space themselves…but that’s a story for another article.
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Source: https://canucksarmy.com/news/fresh-takes-vancouver-canucks-reported-2c-trade-route
