Brady Tkachuk is reportedly off to a Western team and the return is going to shake the league
The Minnesota Wild's asking price for Jesper Wallstedt just leaked.
Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Citizen reported that GM Bill Guerin wants a massive return for the 23-year-old goaltending prospect. And the name being floated as the headline piece is Brady Tkachuk.
Read that one more time. The Senators captain. The face of the franchise. The 26-year-old who carries the room every night. The asking price for a 23-year-old goalie.
That's not a trade conversation. That's an opening bid designed to end one.
Wallstedt is the real deal. The Swedish netminder posted a 0.915 save percentage across 35 games with the Wild this season on a $2.2 million cap hit. He has the pedigree. He has the runway.
But he's also still 23 and trapped behind Filip Gustavsson's $3.75 million contract and 50-game workload. Minnesota has a logjam they have to solve.
Why Ottawa can't even consider this on paper
Steve Staios spent the entire 2025-26 season building around Tkachuk's leadership. The captain finished with 59 points across 60 games, including 5 power-play goals and 15 power-play assists on an $8.2 million cap hit.
He's the heartbeat. He's also a 26-year-old in his prime, locked in long-term, exactly the kind of franchise player you don't trade unless someone hands you a generational return.
Wallstedt is not that. He's an excellent prospect who hasn't proven he can carry a 60-game NHL workload yet. The gap between asset values isn't close.
Ottawa needs a goaltender. Linus Ullmark finished at a 0.890 save percentage across 49 starts. Leevi Merilainen sat at 0.859. The position is a problem.
Honestly, this asking price reads more like Guerin closing the door than opening one. You float Brady Tkachuk to make sure nobody calls about Wallstedt again.
Could Staios get creative with a package built around a different centerpiece? Probably. Jake Sanderson is the kind of young defender other teams chase. Tim Stutzle is rarely mentioned but would unlock conversations like this one.
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Travis Green's bench inherited a goalie problem when he was hired. Solving it without surrendering the captain is the entire challenge of Ottawa's off-season.
The Senators have already been linked to Devon Levi in other reports. The position is clearly the priority. The cost is the entire conversation.
The Wild are bluffing or they're serious. Either way, the answer from Ottawa is the same. The captain isn't moving.
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MAY 26, 2026
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| G | A | PTS | ||
| Mark Stone | 1 | - | 1 | |
| Brayden McNabb | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Shea Theodore | - | 1 | 1 | |
| Rasmus Andersson | - | - | - | |
| Ivan Barbashev | - | - | - | |
| Mackenzie Blackwood | - | - | - | |
| Brent Burns | - | - | - | |
| Dylan Coghlan | - | - | - | |
| Ross Colton | - | - | - | |
| Pavel Dorofeyev | - | - | - | |
| Nic Dowd | - | - | - | |
| Jack Drury | - | - | - | |
| Jack Eichel | - | - | - | |
| Noah Hanifin | - | - | - | |
| Carter Hart | - | - | - | |
| Tomas Hertl | - | - | - | |
| Brett Howden | - | - | - | |
| Nazem Kadri | - | - | - | |
| William Karlsson | - | - | - | |
| Parker Kelly | - | - | - | |
| COMPLETE STATS | ||||