{"id":503224,"date":"2026-02-25T13:35:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T13:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/503224\/"},"modified":"2026-02-25T13:35:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T13:35:09","slug":"the-7-underrated-players-teams-should-target-at-the-2026-nhl-trade-deadline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/503224\/","title":{"rendered":"The 7 Underrated Players Teams Should Target at the 2026 NHL Trade Deadline"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">It might seem strange for the Anaheim Ducks\u2014currently in a playoff spot and playing some of their best hockey this season\u2014to consider moving a 22\u2011year\u2011old puck\u2011moving defenseman, but with Joel Quenneville firmly installing his own approach, some players once pegged as part of the Ducks&#8217; future core are struggling to find their place, and Pavel Mintyukov is one of them. <\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Mintyukov has been a healthy scratch a few times this season and is entrenched on the team&#8217;s third pairing after fellow young defensemen Jackson LaCombe and Olen Zellweger leapt over him on the depth chart. <\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Elliotte Friedman <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"http:\/\/sportsnet.ca\/nhl\/article\/32-thoughts-bedard-celebrini-making-strong-cases-for-team-canada\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">reported<\/a> earlier this season that Mintyukov was open to a move, yet he&#8217;s still logging steady minutes\u2014nearly 18 per game\u2014and is being used in all situations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Still, the Russian is not meant to be a third-pairing defender, and a player at his age and skill level would not come cheaply for a team enterprising enough to make a competitive offer for him. <\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">While a rebuilding team might be tempted into targeting him, he could be a sneaky good pickup for a club in need of a youthful injection of depth to grow on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It might seem strange for the Anaheim Ducks\u2014currently in a playoff spot and playing some of their best&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":503225,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-503224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503224\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}