
By Pierre LeBrun, Michael Russo and Eric Stephens
The Minnesota Wild acquired defenseman John Klingberg from the Anaheim Ducks just before Friday’s trade deadline, the teams announced. Here’s what you need to know:
- The Ducks receive a 2025 fourth-round pick, defenseman Andrej Šustr and the rights to prospect Nikita Nesterenko. The Ducks are retaining 50 percent of Klingberg’s salary.
- Klingberg, 30, signed a one-year, $7 million contract with the Ducks in the offseason after spending the first eight years of his NHL career with the Dallas Stars.
- Klingberg has eight goals and 16 assists through 50 games played.
- The 2018 All-Star narrowly avoided injury in early February after getting hit with a high stick from the Blackhawks’ Boris Katchouk under his visor, missing his eye by inches.
The Athletic’s instant analysis:
Wild get their defenseman
It just felt all day today that the Wild would be looking to add a defenseman. Klingberg had a tough year playing for a defensively-awful Ducks team, but he comes to one of the best defensive teams in the NHL and should be able to help the second power-play unit as well. The Wild may have had options to trade Alex Goligoski, but he says he never was asked to officially waive his no-move clause. This means the Wild suddenly have a ton of depth on the blue line.
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They will carry eight defensemen once injured Jonas Brodin returns to the lineup, meaning Goligoski and one of Jon Merrill or more likely Calen Addison will be extras. This will grow to nine when it’s anticipated that the Wild will sign Brock Faber, acquired in last summer’s Kevin Fiala trade, after the University of Minnesota season comes to an end. — Russo
Evaluating the Ducks’ return for Klingberg
It is terrible, to be brutally frank here. Part of the goal in general manager Pat Verbeek signing the 30-year-old was that he could flip him for another first-round pick in this potentially fruitful draft if the Ducks struggled but the veteran had a productive season and restored some of his past value in the eyes of league executives. Instead, Klingberg started horribly, as his defensive shortcomings were glaring on a team that’s allowed the most goals in the NHL, and lost his spot on the top power-play unit to Cam Fowler right away.
He did recover to put up eight goals and 16 assists in 50 games and his atrocious underlying numbers and minus-28 rating might not matter on a Wild team that’s much better and usually plays a sound system that can better hide his deficiencies. But Verbeek needed to get something. Had to. Otherwise, what was the point of it all? Not moving him would have been a complete waste. Yes, Verbeek got nothing remotely close to what was once possible. Something is better than nothing, though. — Stephens
Who is Nikita Nesterenko?
A promising nugget? That would be the best-case scenario for Anaheim if the junior forward at Boston College amounts to anything. Nesterenko offers intriguing potential and has good size at 6-foot-2 and 183 pounds. Minnesota drafted him as a center but he’s often played on the wing for the Eagles. Top-five pick Cutter Gauthier gets most of the attention, but Nesterenko is having a breakout season with 11 goals and 19 assists in 32 games. He has compared his style of play to that of Evgeny Kuznetsov.
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The Ducks will want to get him signed (and perhaps could) as he can elect for free agency given that he’ll be four years removed from the Wild drafting him in the sixth round. Indications recently were that he did not plan to sign with Minnesota. Nesterenko is of Russian heritage but is a Brooklyn native after his parents emigrated to the United States. — Stephens
Backstory
Klingberg, 30, signed a one-year, $7 million contract with the Ducks on July 29, 2022. He previously spent eight seasons with the Dallas Stars, which included a Stanley Cup Final appearance during the 2019-20 season.
For his career, Klingberg has 79 goals and 319 assists through 602 games played.
The Wild (35-21-6) sit second in the Central Division, while the Ducks (20-34-8) are last in the Pacific Division.
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(Photo: Jerome Miron / USA Today)
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