{"id":318083,"date":"2026-05-16T00:54:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T00:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/318083\/"},"modified":"2026-05-16T00:54:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T00:54:09","slug":"anaheim-ducks-poised-for-franchise-altering-move-this-summer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/318083\/","title":{"rendered":"Anaheim Ducks Poised For ‘Franchise-Altering’ Move This Summer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Anaheim<\/a>
The Anaheim Ducks<\/a> succumbed to the Vegas Golden Knights in Game 6 Thursday night, and their season is done. But what a season it was, as they boldly emerged from their more-than-half-decade-long rebuild with a run to the playoffs for the first time in eight years, and the second round, no less.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But they won’t be resting on their laurels. Eric Stephens writes in The Athletic<\/a> that the next step could be a ‘franchise-altering’ move this summer, as they hope to take yet another big leap.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He mentions the Ducks in the same breath as four potential star-player targets this offseason:<\/p>\n

Auston MatthewsJason RobertsonRobert ThomasBrady Tkachuk<\/p>\n

Any of those four, which include two captains, three first-line centers, a 69-goal scorer and a three-time 40-goal scorer, would certainly be “franchise-altering.” And due to varying situations, any or all of them could be available for a trade this summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Matthews has apparently not decided on his future with the Toronto Maple Leafs until he meets with the new management team<\/a>; Robertson is an RFA who’s looking for a massive contract that the Dallas Stars can’t currently afford<\/a>; Thomas was on the trade block by the St. Louis Blues at the deadline, and likely will be again this offseason; and Tkachuk has had his name in the rumor mill<\/a> after receiving a perceived negative reaction in Ottawa after he returned from winning the Olympic Gold for Team USA.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Stephens likened the potential big swing for a player of that ilk this offseason to the one the Ducks pulled off 20 years ago, which led to a Stanley Cup.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“What shouldn\u2019t be ruled out is a move like the Ducks made 20 years ago, when they added Chris Pronger as the massive final piece to their Stanley Cup-winning team in 2007 following a run to the Western Conference final…<\/p>\n

“What this can\u2019t be for the Ducks is a one-off… This run needs to be the liftoff.”<\/p>\n

Photo: \u00a9 David Kirouac-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Anaheim Ducks succumbed to the Vegas Golden Knights in Game 6 Thursday night, and their season is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318084,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164],"class_list":["post-318083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}