What we’re hearing about a Marco Rossi trade, potential destinations and return
Which teams could be "screaming" for him? What could the return be? Here's the latest on the No. 2 player on The Athletic's trade board.
By Michael Russo, Joe Smith
When it comes to Marco Rossi being at a crossroads with the Minnesota Wild, it’s all about value.
And not just his average annual value.
President of hockey operations and general manager Bill Guerin has said he likes Rossi but has a certain number he’s comfortable paying the pending restricted free agent. He’s made a couple “significant” offers, he said, including for a shorter bridge deal last week.
There was another call between the sides on Tuesday, per league sources, and Rossi’s agent, Ian Pulver, reiterated that a bridge deal no longer makes sense for Rossi after he was buried on the fourth line in the playoffs.
Since the Wild don’t seem to have an appetite to invest in a long-term deal for Rossi at an AAV around Matt Boldy’s $7 million, it sure feels like his time in Minnesota could be coming to an end over the next few weeks. We know Rossi already turned down a five-year, $25 million offer a few months ago.
Brock Nelson, a veteran center the Wild planned to pursue in free agency, re-signed with the Colorado Avalanche on Wednesday at the tune of three years with a $7.5 million AAV. So the Wild will need a Plan B, especially if they trade Rossi. Centers who could be available in free agency if they remain unsigned before July 1 include the Florida Panthers’ Sam Bennett, Toronto Maple Leafs’ John Tavares, Dallas Stars’ Matt Duchene, Ottawa Senators’ Claude Giroux and Jonathan Toews, who last played for the Chicago Blackhawks in 2023.
If the free-agent route doesn’t make sense, the Wild would have to acquire a center via trade, either in a possible Rossi deal or another.
Guerin confirmed last week that teams are showing interest in Rossi, and there will come a point where Pulver can also shop for offer sheets in advance of Rossi officially becoming a restricted free agent July 1.
Rossi played top-six minutes for most of this past season and was the team’s second-leading scorer before being “very disappointed” to see himself get the third-lowest ice time on the team during the Wild’s first-round playoff series loss to the Vegas Golden Knights. Rossi said he had an “honest” and “man-like” exit meeting with coach John Hynes. So it’s not just his contract, but what his role might be, which is “the subject of great debate,” as Pulver told The Athletic.
The good news for Rossi, 23, is that any team that acquires him knows it must pay him, so that would mean he’s wanted and a likely part of his next team’s future.
The most telling value in all of this is how much other NHL teams have for Rossi, who is No. 2 on The Athletic’s offseason trade board for a reason.
But trading a young center means pressure on Guerin. The Wild have spent 25 years trying to draft and develop talented centers, and successes have been few and far between (Mikko Koivu, Joel Eriksson Ek, Rossi).
So Guerin would have to figure out a way to parlay Rossi into a significant return, because as the GM told The Athletic last week, he doesn’t want to make the team worse.
Say what you want about Rossi, but he’s shown the past two years on an injury-riddled team that he’s able to play full 82-game seasons and produce. That production is not easily replaceable. There’s a reason Guerin has said he’s not “dying” to trade him.
“I can’t imagine Marco Rossi would not have value and really good value around the NHL,” former NHL GM Craig Button told The Athletic recently. “There are teams screaming, screaming for that type of player.”
Which teams could be “screaming” for him? What could the return be? Here’s what we’re hearing, with insight from The Athletic’s local beat writers.
Vancouver Canucks
Canucks beat writer Thomas Drance: The Canucks’ most urgent need this summer, explicitly, is a “top-two-lines center.” That’s a description that applies in straightforward fashion to Rossi, both in terms of deployment and production.
Honestly, the opportunity to add a 23-year-old pivot who led all Wild centers in five-on-five ice time during the regular season and produced 60 points seems almost too good to be true from a Canucks perspective. It’s exactly the sort of player this club requires to bolster its center talent in the wake of last season’s J.T. Miller trade.
In an ideal world, perhaps, the Canucks would prefer to land a larger right-handed center than Rossi (5 feet 9, 182 pounds). Vancouver’s need for skill and upside in the middle of its forward group is too significant, though, to overthink this because of marginal fit or traits-based concerns. Rossi is a gifted young center, and the Canucks are desperate to add a gifted young center, so the fit here is obvious.
If the Canucks decide to get into the Rossi business this summer, they’ll have some desirable assets to dangle in exchange.
The club’s 2025 15th pick is very available on the trade market and would presumably be the centerpiece of any Rossi package. The club could sweeten the pot further with a young blue-line prospect like Victor Mancini or Sawyer Mynio, a young NHL player like Nils Höglander, or even goaltender Artūrs Šilovs, who has been a star for AHL Abbotsford in the Calder Cup playoffs after a difficult NHL campaign.
If the Wild want a center back to preserve some flexibility heading into the offseason, the Canucks are expected to consider parting ways with unrestricted free agent Teddy Blueger and his $1.8 million expiring cap hit. He’s a player Guerin has a fair bit of familiarity with from his time as an AHL general manager in the Pittsburgh Penguins organization.
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