Fantasy Hockey Blockbuster Trade Breakdown: Mikko Rantanen, Martin Necas, Taylor Hall and Jack Drury

A huge blockbuster trade has an immediate impact for several NHL teams, as well as your fantasy rosters. Whether you own one of these players, or have players that will be on lines with them, this trade has turned the NHL world upside down trying to figure it out.

Let’s look at the trade, then break down the impact for each team this is going to have.

The Trade

As per Frank Seravalli’s tweet: 

To the Carolina Hurricanes: Mikko Rantanen, Taylor Hall

To the Colorado Avalanche: Martin Necas, Jack Drury, 2025 Second Round Pick, 2026 Fourth Round Pick (all from Carolina)

To the Chicago Blackhawks: 2025 Third Round Pick (their own returned from Carolina), 50% of Rantanen’s salary

What this Means for the Blackhawks

We’ll start small, to get it out of the way. The Blackhawks got their third round pick back, which doesn’t really mean anything for fantasy. This is the same for the 50% retention of Rantanen’s salary, and actually this doesn’t really mean anything for the team either because Rantanen is on an expiring deal, and the Hawks have some cap space to burn.

They did get their own third round pick back, which I mean, good for them! They will go down in history as being part of both:

1. Another underwhelming Hall trade, and

2. The scapegoat for the biggest trade of the season (Unless Sidney Crosby also gets traded, which at this point is unlikely).

One last funny note, as I was doing research for this article as the trade broke the internet, someone had a funny thought: Poor Connor Bedard will see Rantanen on roster and payroll for the Blackhawks and have a glimmer of hope (both in general, and on the ice), but sadly will not get to see him be his teammate. Poor Bedard. Maybe next year, kid.

What this Means for the Canes

Rantanen is obviously the biggest moving piece in this trade. It is a blockbuster among blockbusters. Rantanen is going from sharing a line on the Avs with Nathan MacKinnon, to sharing a line on the Canes with fellow Finnish player Sebastian Aho. As mentioned before, this year Mikko’s salary is retained by the Hawks by 50%.

This deal will really only be solidified for the Canes future if they are able to get Rantanen to ink a deal with them long term. They can’t botch this like they did with Jake Guentzel, and fail to get him signed.

Rantanen is also going to be a mainstay on the top powerplay unit, which again is going to elevate the value and production of everyone on that line. Aho, Andrei Svechnikov, Seth Jarvis, and Shayne Gostisbehere owners rejoice!

This season, Rantanen is a scoring machine, and this move may slow him down (albeit only a little), but the production of everyone around him will spike.

He has 25 goals, 39 assists, 19 powerplay points, and 135 shots on goal. He also has 28 hits, and 32 blocked shots in 49 games played.

For Hall, I would say he is definitely a streamer option now. He is going to likely play a middle six role, and get some second powerplay unit minutes. While this isn’t great, especially for a streamer, this deal takes the Canes to a new level. I would watch out for them to explode and become a lethal opponent.

Hall has had a Hall year. He’s been just OK since 2017-2018 campaign with the New Jersey Devils where he put up 93 points. He has not been anywhere close to that since, but may be serviceable in this diminished role.

He has nine goals, 15 assists, and three powerplay points in 46 games played with the Blackhawks. He also added 82 shots on goal, 23 hits, and 29 blocked shots.

What this Means for the Avs

Necas was obviously the big grab here. This season he had a lot of doubters that he could repeat. He had a decent couple years, but it looked more lucky than it did sustainable, yet here we are. He’s been traded for Rantanen and has continued his big production numbers.

Necas has 16 goals, 39 assists, 22 powerplay points and 113 shots on goal. His peripherals aren’t the best, but for all intents and purposes for comparison he has 40 hits and 16 blocked shots in 49 games played.

All in all, pretty similar numbers. Not as elite, no. Not as good of a finisher, either. But, now he's going to be playing next to Nate MacK, so his production is actually going to go up. 

He will also be playing on the powerplay with the aforementioned MacKinnon, but adding Jonathan Drouin (also on the top forward line with both), Artturi Lehkonen, and the most elite defenseman in the NHL: Cale Makar.  

Drury can have an honorable mention here. He may slot into a bottom six role, but is likely to be on the fourth line and won’t see any powerplay or penalty kill time. He was a depth piece in this trade at best. Awesome for him though, especially if he can challenge for a long-term role in this forward group.

He has an underwhelming three goals, six assists, and 60 shots on goal in 39 games played.

Closing Thoughts

As mentioned, this is, and likely will remain to be the biggest trade of the season. It is huge for not only the Canes and the Avs, but every single player that will share the ice with Rantanen and Necas. It’s going to mix up the dynamics.

I love a good old fashioned hockey trade, and at it’s core, this is just that. Rantanen and Necas owners rejoice, and everyone catching an uptick of production with their rostered players because of this move, you can rejoice, too. I know I will!