MTPS: Selling the Bread(man) Before It Gets Stale

Friends—we’ve been here before.

Roberto talked about it in 2024.

Chris talked about it in 2024.

I talked about it in 2025.

But, here we are again. With only about seven months to go until his seven year $81,499,999 contract expires, Artemi Panarin’s future on Broadway is as murky as the waters of the East River. 

Recently it was (probably strategically) leaked that Panarin’s camp had rejected an offer from the Rangers for an “Anze Kopitar” style extension according to NHL Insider Elliotte Friedman.

“I understand, at some point in the off-season, the Rangers had that kind of conceptual conversation with Panarin: ‘Is there a way you could do for the Rangers what Kopitar did for the Kings?’” Friedman said. “Obviously, at this point and time, it hasn’t happened. I don’t know where that’s going to go, I don’t know if that’s going to be a possibility, but I do know the two sides had the conversation and, obviously, at this point, Panarin is unsigned.”

Fellow Insider Dave Pagnotta added fuel to the fire with this nugget:

But wait…there’s more

Johnny Lazerus recently joined Joe on the podcast and broke it down even more.

So, there are a couple of things to unpack here. Tyler and Liam connect Panarin to Brad Marchand as a great player in his walk year on a bad team. Pagnotta and Seravalli both suggest that a trade could happen if the Rangers are on the bubble or worse.

I’ll go a step beyond that: Colorado and Carolina were both contenders last year and both traded Mikko Rantanen rather than losing him to free agency for nothing. 

Look, the Rangers cannot let Panarin walk as a free agent at the end of the year. That would be terrible asset management and, despite what many of you may think about Chris Drury, the examples of him squandering actual assets are few and far between. At the same time, the Rangers cannot give a 34-year-old Artemi Panarin both big money and term, even if it theoretically props open their contention window for a couple of more seasons. This isn’t the Florida Panthers here where you’ve already won two Cups, your legacy is already set in stone, and now you’re just chasing history. 

That leaves two options:

• Hope Panarin and the Rangers can agree on a deal that makes sense for both sides, either a short term/decent money deal like the one he already rejected or something similar to what John Tavares and Matt Duchene signed this past summer where they both received four year deals in the $4 million range. 
• Trade Panarin.

Given the state of the UFA market, and the fact that Panarin is now clearly the best player available on it, I have no faith in the first thing happening. That means—whether it is tomorrow, December, or March—my friends, the end is nigh.

And look, that’s alright. I’ve argued that Panarin was the right player at absolutely the wrong time for the Rangers, while others have dogged him because he’s not a fierce defender and forechecker. Whatever, the dude was nothing short of fantastic. We had six-plus years of this guy playing like a video game on cheat mode here. Don’t be sad that it’s over; be glad that it happened.

With all of that being said, there are things to consider when talking about a Panarin trade. First and foremost, Panarin has a complete and total no-movement clause, which means that he will only go where he wants to go. I’ve never spoken to the man, but let’s assume he has no interest in going to teams that currently suck. There have been some people who have tried connecting him to the Carolina Hurricanes and, friends, I'm here to tell you that there's not a single contender in all of the National Hockey League that I can think of that Artemi Panarin would rather not play for than Rod Brind'Amour's Carolina Hurricanes.

Second, based on what happened last year with Rantanen and Carolina, let’s also assume that teams are going to want to discuss an extension with Panarin before they consummate a trade that sends major assets back to New York (and bet your ass the assets will be major).

And finally, James Dolan would have to sign off on the move. This shouldn’t be discounted as an obstacle. Dolan is not a hockey guy; he’s a business guy and he wants the Garden full. If he believes that letting Panarin play out the string helps the Rangers sell tickets, Drury will need a compelling argument to get him on board with a trade, and that argument can’t just be about being competitive in the future. 

For now though, let us put that last hurdle in a box and store it away in a deep, dark closet—preferably a closet that leads to Narnia where we never have to deal with it again. Let’s just focus on some trade options.

Trading Panarin doesn’t just qualify as a big deal, it qualifies as a BFD (look it up if you don't understand) and, as such, needs more than one trade proposal that sucks. As such, I’ve asked for some help from my friends Roberto and Chris. Kind of like the X-Men, but, well...

We all pretty much agreed that the Florida Panthers or Dallas Stars are probably Panarin's top two destinations if he were to be moved, but we also agreed that Florida has absolutely nothing to offer the Rangers in return and Dallas doesn't have the financial wiggle room to add Panarin even if the Rangers did retain money on his contract.

Onto the trades...