The trade between the New York Rangers and Anaheim Ducks involving Chris Kreider was a long time coming.
It was speculated for months that Kreider could be traded. Rangers president and general manager Chris Drury has kept Kreider in the loop about his intentions.
Kreider’s agent, Matt Keator, confirmed some specifics regarding what went down behind the scenes before this trade came to fruition.
“First of all, kudos to Chris Drury who did a great job messaging, communicating between Chris and I throughout the whole process.” Keator said. “We knew there was a chance something like this could happen. He had asked us for a list of teams that we would go to…
“Things in Anaheim have really changed for the better with Joel Quenneville getting there and with what Pat Verbeek has done there and there pose to win. Chris wants to win. The math didn’t add up in New York, it was time.”
Kreider spent 13 seasons with the Rangers. It was a really seamless and successful 13 years, up until when Kreider’s play regressed tremendously while he dealt with several nagging injuries throughout this past season.
The 34-year-old forward was also publicly mentioned by Drury as a player he’s open to trading in order to shake up the roster.
It’s safe to assume that Kreider is in need of a fresh start.
Maybe a fresh start is all Kreider needs to return to his former glory. His agent seems to think along those lines.
“I actually use Brad Marchand as an example of a guy who change is good,” Keator emphasized. “Change can be refreshing for a player and I think in Chris’s case, it’s going to be very refreshing because he has five and a half months from his last hockey game to his next hockey game. He’s utilizing the time all the time to prepare his body and mentally get ready for the season. I think he’s going to have a great year.”
It’s important to note that Kreider recorded 75 points during the 2023-24 campaign, so he’s not far removed from having an All-Star caliber season.
Even during what many consider to be an off-year for Kreider, he still posted 22 goals and he wasn’t fully healthy for the majority of the season.
Kreider will likely play a top-six role for the Ducks and slot in on either the first or second unit of the power play, so that increased workload should give him a golden opportunity to bounce back.
In Anaheim, Kreider is clearly wanted and the organization has a vision for what they want to see out of the veteran forward.
“Well, there’s a whole host of things that attracted Chris Kreider for our organization,” Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek said. “I think we can start with the skating ability, we can start with his size, we can start with the strength that he has. He’s 203 pounds; he’s a force in front of the net. His goal-scoring ability, even though he had a tough year last year, I fully believe he’s going to bounce back and have a great season for us. I think that he’s going to be a real example for all our young guys on how to score goals in tough situations, be that in the playoffs, scoring in tight to the net, deflections, and rebound goals. I just think that he’s going to be a shining example for all our young guys in that area.
Chris Kreider Clears The Air About Transparency With Rangers Management And Explains Reasoning For Waiving No-Trade Clause
For the entirety of Chris Kreider's career, he’s been with one team until now as the New York <a href="https://thehockeynews.com/nhl/new-york-rangers/" target="_blank">Rangers</a> traded the veteran forward to the Anaheim Ducks on Thursday.
“There’s also the power play. Our power play needed a boost, and I believe he’s going to be a difficult person to defend in front of the net. He seems to have a really good ability to be able to get a loose stick, get his body in the right position to score rebounds.He’s also a very good penalty killer. That’s another area that I wanted to improve upon for our group, and I think that he’s going to be a threat to score shorthanded. Obviously, the size and the reach that he has and his skating ability to be able to get to loose pucks and get them out of the zone, be able to work within our system, and how we’re going to want to kill aggressively. So I think that there are so many positives to acquiring Chris Kreider.”
Verbeek has high hopes for his acquisition of Kreider and now we'll get to see if Keator is right about a change of scenery being the difference for Kreider’s potential revival.