Why Rangers should at least consider trade for polarizing Mason McTavish
An intriguing, and polarizing, player sits atop Daily Faceoff’s 2026 NHL trade board this offseason. And Mason McTavish is someone the New York Rangers should at least discuss internally and consider as an option during their stated “retool.”
That’s not to say it’s a slam-dunk decision to go out and try to acquire the 23-year-old Anaheim Ducks center. There are some red flags, including that he was a healthy scratch twice in Anaheim’s six-game loss to the Vegas Golden Knights in their best-of-7 second-round playoff series.
McTavish scored one goal and had five assists in 10 postseason games, making his first Stanley Cup Playoff experience feel quite underwhelming, despite Anaheim taking out the Edmonton Oilers in six games in the first round. And in a rousing regular season, when the Ducks finished third in the Pacific Division and qualified for the playoffs for the first time in eight years, McTavish went backwards with his production, scoring 17 goals and totaling 41 points.
This after McTavish established career highs with 22 goals, 30 assists, and 52 points in 2024-25. That earned him a six-year, $42 million contract in late September, though only after he held out at the start of training camp to put the squeeze on Anaheim in negotiations.
That didn’t sit well with Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek, who nonetheless doled out a contract for $7 million annually that equals forwards Troy Terry and Mikael Granlund for highest AAV with the Ducks.
What complicates the financial situation here is that Anaheim enters this offseason needing to re-sign young studs Leo Carlsson and Cutter Gauthier, who are restricted free agents this summer and the two best players on the Ducks. That’s going to cost the Ducks some serious money. Plus they must re-sign or replace at least one or both of UFA right-shot defensemen Jacob Trouba and John Carlson. Oh, and captain Radko Gudas can become an unrestricted free agent, too, and young d-man Olen Zellweger is an RFA.
True, Anaheim enters the offseason with approximately $40.5 million in cap space, per PuckPedia, but that can be whittled down quickly in a busy summer.
Why Rangers could have interest in Mason McTavish trade
All of this brings us to the Rangers. McTavish sounds a bit like Alexis Lafreniere. A top draft pick — McTavish went No. 3 overall to the Ducks in 2021, one year after Lafreniere was No. 1 overall — with good size and high-end skill, that went backwards after signing a long-term contract following a mini breakout season.
The Rangers continue to hold on to Lafreniere, who did bounce back to equal his career high with 57 points this season. But the argument to trade Lafreniere is that the 24-year-old will never reach his full potential in New York, where there will always be an inordinate amount of pressure being a former No. 1 overall pick.
McTavish can be viewed through the same lens. And he certainly fits much of general manager Chris Drury’s stated desire to improve the skill level of the Rangers, and acquire young NHL talent and/or NHL-ready prospects, as opposed to adding more future draft picks.
If McTavish is at all a buy-low option presently, the Rangers must have some level of interest. Perhaps the most important evaluation and opinion here comes from coach Mike Sullivan. If he envisions a player to be a good fit in his system, one that he can trust, and help grow into his full potential, the Rangers must be aggressive in trying to land him.
This becomes even more so should the Rangers trade center Vincent Trocheck this summer, creating an opening down the middle which McTavish could fill. Now, he’s not the elite face-off man Trocheck is, nor the same two-way player. But there is a lot of upside and flexibility there with McTavish, who also can play on the wing, and is a proven power-play performer.
And remember, though it’s not an apples to apples comparison, the Ducks did trade skilled forward Trevor Zegras, then 24 and a former No. 9 overall pick, to the Philadelphia Flyers last summer. And Zegras responded by setting career highs with 26 goals and 67 points in 2025-26.
As a side note, the respected Matt Larkin’s list over at Daily Faceoff has Trocheck as the second player on the trade board. And most of the options listed are, like Trocheck, players over 30, many in there mid-30’s. The most attractive under-30 options are St. Louis Blues star forwards Robert Thomas (26) and Jordan Kyrou (28), McTavish, and, you knew it was coming. Lafreniere. Vancouver Canucks center Elias Pettersson (27) is also on that list, but, you know, there’s that J.T. Miller issue, making him a non-starter for the Rangers.
McTavish wouldn’t come cheap — perhaps costing the Rangers Braden Schneider and a future first-round pick to start. But it’s worth having the conversation, especially if Sullivan is gung-ho about McTavish.
