Why the Anaheim Ducks should trade for Matthew Tkachuk
The 2022 NHL offseason took a turn for the dramatic this week when The Athletic reported that Calgary Flames restricted free agent winger Matthew Tkachuk was not interested in signing a long-term extension. This makes it all but a certainty that Tkachuk will be traded before the start of the season.
Even after the free agent signings of forwards Ryan Strome and Frank Vatrano, the Anaheim Ducks still have approximately $30.7 million in total cap space going into the 2022-2023 season, and most importantly, they still need to spend approximately $9.3 million to reach the cap floor (per CapFriendly). Given this considerable amount of financial flexibility, should Ducks GM Pat Verbeek be all-in on trading for Tkachuk? This would undoubtedly be a franchise-altering transaction whose ramifications would emanate throughout Anaheim for years to come.
I will make an argument below for why the Anaheim Ducks should absolutely be looking to obtain Tkachuk in a trade this summer.
Tkachuk’s On-Ice Impact in Calgary
Ducks fans who are vocally in favor of a trade for Tkachuk have a pretty easy case to make based on his performance in Calgary. Tkachuk’s 3-year RAPM chart from 2019-2022 (shown below courtesy of Evolving Hockey) indicates that he is an elite two-way player, and is particularly lethal in generating and suppressing shots. He was also outstanding at generating quality chances on the power play.
Tkachuk also grades out as an elite two-way forward in Evolving Hockey’s Goals Above Replacement (GAR) model (shown below for the 2019-2022 period). He ranked in the 97th percentile overall for GAR during this period, meaning that the goals Tkachuk added to his team during the 2019-2022 period ranked higher than 97% of the rest of the players in the NHL. His impact was particularly pronounced at even strength (EV; left panel).
Another useful approach in evaluating Tkachuk’s on-ice impact is displayed in HockeyViz's With-or-Without-You tool, shown below for Tkachuk during the 2021-2022 season. The y-axis of the graph is xGA/60 (inverted), and the x-axis of the graph is xGF/60. Data points in the top-right portion of the graph are considered “good”, as they indicate a high xGF/60 value and a low xGA/60 value for a given player. Data points in the lower-left portion of the graph have high xGA/60 and low xGF/60 values, and thus are considered “bad”. The purpose of this graph is to show how Tkachuk’s linemates from last season’s Flames team performed with and without him on the ice, and also to show how Tkachuk himself performed without each of the players.
The first thing to note above is that when Tkachuk was on the ice, the rest of his linemates performed exceptionally well, as indicated by the cluster of players (with black box outlines) in the top-right portion of the graph. This indicates that Tkachuk’s on-ice impact on his linemates was very favorable, generating significantly more quality chances than were allowed. The second notable aspect of this graph is that each teammate performed substantially worse without Tkachuk on the ice. This can be seen by comparing the locations of the black boxes (player with Tkachuk) to the location of the red boxes (player without Tkachuk). In particular, Johnny Gaudreau and Elias Lindholm went from >50% xGF with Tkachuk on the ice, to <50% xGF without him. In addition, Tkachuk was a >50% xGF player regardless of who he played with, as evidenced by all of the blue boxes (Tkachuk without player) being to the top-right of the red line.
How many assets should Verbeek be willing to deal?
The Ducks are in as favorable a position as any team in the league from an assets perspective to make a competitive trade offer for Tkachuk. We project that the Ducks could offer a 2024 1st round pick (unprotected), a 2023 2nd round pick, defenseman Jamie Drysdale, and center Isac Lundestrom in exchange for Tkachuk, with the requirement that Tkachuk sign at least a 6-year extension to stay in Anaheim through his age-30 season. This offer would be in the ballpark of what the reported asking price for the Flames is at currently (see below).
Tkachuk to Anaheim? Yes, please!
Tkachuk’s on-ice impact over the last three seasons with the Flames was invaluable, and he clearly established himself as one of the truly elite players in the NHL. His fellow Flames stars Johnny Gaudreau and Elias Lindholm suffered greatly without Tkachuk on the ice, while Tkachuk himself remained a >50% xGF player without them. In addition, Tkachuk is only 24 years old, which aligns extremely well with the contending window of the Ducks’ young core going forward. Verbeek should be doing everything possible to obtain a player of this caliber, and Tkachuk’s overall fit with the rest of Anaheim’s core of young players could not be better.