Jim Rutherford Speaks On The Canucks’ Plans For The 2026 NHL Trade Deadline

The 2026 NHL Trade Deadline is only a little more than a week away. Despite the NHL just returning to play on Wednesday, the Vancouver Canucks have made themselves a large presence in the trade market, namely due to rumours surrounding defenceman Tyler Myers’ future with the team. 

Last night, during a 3–2 overtime loss to the Winnipeg Jets, Myers was made a healthy-scratch due to roster management reasons. As today has progressed, more has come out about the situation with the veteran defenceman, with Canucks President of Hockey Operations Jim Rutherford speaking on it during an interview with the 100% Hockey podcast. 

“We do have an offer for him. We’re working through that process now, and we’ll see where it goes. Nothing’s final at this point,” Rutherford told podcast hosts John Shannon and Daren Millard. “It was just being cautious last night. You don’t want a player to play in a game and get injured when potentially something might happen.” 

The thing that has complicated a potential Myers trade is the fact that the defenceman’s contract currently has a no-movement clause, meaning he controls whether he’s traded or not and where-to if that’s the case. This clause shifts to a 12-team no-trade list next year, which would give Vancouver more control over where the defenceman goes if he remains with the team and if they still want to trade him. 

“It’s a little bit of everything. It’s just the process. Patrik’s the one that’s doing this, and I got an update earlier this morning, and everybody’s trying to work together to see if something works.”

The course of the current season has been difficult for the Canucks and their fans, as Vancouver has sat comfortably at the bottom of the NHL’s standings for at least a couple of months now. They’ve already made two big moves throughout the season, trading captain Quinn Hughes and Kiefer Sherwood, and while many expect that they’ll be busy in the lead-up to the deadline, Rutherford warned that there’s a chance this may not be the case. 

“We’ll be as active as possible if, in fact, something makes sense for our return. We’re not out looking to just give away players. I don’t know how many younger players, mid 20s to younger, that are going to be available that we could acquire, but we’re going to look at all possibilities, sticking to that plan of staying younger, getting a group together that can come together over the next couple of years as a team and start to get in a position that we should be in, but at this point in time, the market is very slow. Patrik does the deals, he talks to the GMs, but talking to a couple of other people that hold the same position as me, they are surprised too, how slow the market’s moving. So it may end up that it’s a slower deadline because of some of the rule changes and how teams have to approach things going forward for the playoffs, or maybe it’s just going to open up here next week, getting closer to the deadline.” 

Regardless of what happens in the next couple of weeks, the trade deadline will play a big role in how Vancouver approaches their future moving forward. This includes the 2026 NHL Draft, in which the Canucks are expected to make their first selection relatively high-up. 

“I think it starts here with the next week, and I can give you that answer a lot better after we get past the trade deadline, but we’re going to acquire as many young assets as possible, and that’s probably more in line with being draft picks, position ourselves as strong as we can going into the draft and going into the off-season of free agency, and continue to let the young players play, live with them adjusting to a very tough league. I think that the young guys we have now are doing a really good job, especially young defencemen that are playing as much as they are and doing as well as they are, and they’ll just get better and better, and we’ll look forward to the draft and free agency to see the changes that need to be made so we can start to progress in the right direction next year and build this team up over the next couple of years.”

With the things that have occurred with the Canucks throughout the season, it’s likely felt as though every player’s name has been mentioned in some sort of trade rumour. While things have shifted throughout the season, Rutherford did clarify that there are some members of the team that they won’t field calls on regarding trade interest. However, he also added that “the list is relatively short” and would not give an inkling of which players could be on it. 

Something that may make acquiring players hard, particularly in free agency, is the desire to play in Vancouver, according to Rutherford. The President of Hockey Operations spoke on what the demographic of players who have typically wanted to play in Vancouver look like, with the focus primarily being on those who are from western Canada in particular. 

“I think you’re seeing a trend where the majority of players want to play in the US, but there are players who want to come to Vancouver, and they like the organization. We treat players extremely well here. They like the passion of the market, and they like the city. So we will have a chance to get free agents. It may not be the top guy that everybody will want us to get, that we would probably try to get, but what we need to do now is get as many young players in here and get established that this is a young group that’s going to grow together and want to be here for a long time — that’s our priority right now. 

“We would love to have more Canadian players. So make that very clear. But if there’s a player from whatever country in the world [who] can come and contribute to the Vancouver Canucks, we’re going after that player. But at this point in time, when I look at our team, I’d like to see us have more Canadian players on it.” 

The NHL Trade Deadline takes place on March 6 at 12:00 pm PT. 

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