Trades
Utah Hockey Club Gets: Defender Mikhail Sergachev
Lightning is coming: Defenseman JJ Moser, forward Conor Geekie, 2025 second-round pick, 2024 seventh-round pick (No. 199)
Utah Hockey Club Gets:Defenseman John Marino, fifth-round pick in 2024 (153rd overall)
The devils get: 2024 second-round pick (No. 49, used for goaltender Mikhail Yegorov), 2025 second-round pick
Eric Duhatschek: No matter how closely you scoured the trade sites, you probably didn’t find any mention of Sergachev being traded — to anyone, let alone Utah Hockey League. Sergachev seemed like a key piece for a Lightning team that isn’t giving up on its goal of competing for the Stanley Cup every year. He’s not quite at the Nikita Kucherov-Brayden Point-Andrei Vasilevskiy level, but he’s close.
So that’s the starting point: how quickly things can change in the NHL and how differently things are going to play out in Utah with new ownership. So they’re not sellers anymore. They’re buyers. And Saturday, they went big game hunting.
In Sergachev, Utah has a player who checks all the boxes except durability. He was a true No. 2 in Tampa Bay and that’s only because the Lightning had a true No. 1 in perennial Norris Trophy candidate Victor Hedman. There were times two years ago when the Lightning deployed Sergachev on the top power play unit, leading the team’s defensemen with 64 points (Hedman was the next with 49). Last year didn’t go so well. He played just 34 games and scored just 19 points – a rough year in which he broke his leg in February and was taken off the ice on a stretcher in his first game after missed 17 games with a lower body injury. On some levels, Tampa Bay never really recovered from Sergachev’s extended absences.
Now, of course, they will have to make do without him. But he has a salary cap hit of $8.5 million for the next seven years, which isn’t unreasonable for a player of his pedigree and age (26). But that’s an amount Tampa Bay simply couldn’t afford. His availability therefore contributed to a massive improvement in Utah’s defense, which previously only had the useful Sean Durzi in place as a nominal No. 1. By adding Sergachev and then John Marino in a separate trade with the New Jersey Devils, Utah’s defense becomes deeper, more experienced and just plain better. If Utah’s goal is to finally contend for a playoff spot after years of wandering the NHL wilderness, these two transfers will give them a chance to do just that.
But Tampa Bay also got what it needed, clearing cap space today like they were using a snowplow. Tanner Jeannot, a far too aggressive addition (they gave up five picks to Nashville to get him), was arguably the biggest mistake they ever made to stay in win-now mode. He’s now an LA King.
Moser, meanwhile, is just two years younger than Sergachev and is a restricted free agent coming off his entry-level contract. He won’t do what Sergachev does, but he was second to Utah in time on ice last year, just behind Durzi, and still seems to have an edge. Plus, and most importantly, it will be cheap, at least in the short term. Tampa Bay’s prospect pipeline, which has been exposed by all their winning trades in recent years, is getting a bit replenished with the addition of Conor Geekie, Morgan’s younger brother, who was the 11th pick in the 2022 draft , plus a 2025 second-round pick (originally Toronto’s) and a 2024 seventh-round pick.
In all, two teams made two moves each on Day 2 of the draft, the first of which was so bold that it will have hockey fans talking all summer and into the season. It’s the kind of trade we’d all like to see more of, and one that, in theory, will help both teams better fit their development trajectories.
Having to move Sergachev is the price Tampa Bay is paying for being so aggressive in keeping its core together for as long as it has. Ultimately, you run out of options. There will surely be some schadenfreude around the NHL when this one hits — the fact that the Lightning had to give up such a key piece. But it also gives them some breathing room — to potentially help them get back into the conversation to sign pending UFA Steven Stamkos. And if Tampa Bay’s capital savings aren’t enough to keep Stamkos in the fold, then they could use the extra money to potentially enter the bidding for Jake Guentzel or one of the other high-profile free agents who could hit the market in July. 1.
In short, this is one of the few times we can grudgingly admire what both teams have done to help themselves.
As for the Devils, the fact that they’re getting value back – of any kind – for a player they were willing to part with is a neat, if unspectacular, deal.
Utah Note: See you
Lightning quality: A
Devils Rating: B
Shayna Goldman:After a quiet first day of the draft, Tampa Bay and Utah have just given a boost to the second day.
Before we even get into the nitty-gritty of the deal itself, there’s one overarching theme for Utah so far: The new ownership brings a complete change of pace from the Arizona era. The Coyotes had cap space, but weren’t willing to use it on active players. Utah is already investing heavily in its on-ice product, which makes this move and change in ownership all the more exciting.
And let’s talk about investments, with Utah bringing in Mikhail Sergachev and John Marino.
Utah didn’t have any NHL defensemen signed for next season, so there was a ton of room to make a splash with big free agent signings or trades.
Sergachev arrives in Utah in the second year of an eight-year extension, with an $8.5 million cap hit. The big question is how he can handle tougher minutes. That was the task he faced in 2022-23, when the Lightning moved Ryan McDonagh, and Victor Herman eventually had to absorb some of that workload when Sergachev seemed to struggle. But that midseason usage adjustment allowed Sergachev to flourish offensively and play to his strengths. The problem is that the Lightning (and the rest of the league, really) didn’t have a chance to rethink how Sergachev could handle those minutes this year because injuries kept him out for most of the season.
But maybe Utah won’t need him to fill that role, because it’s not like they have a Hedman ahead of him on the depth chart. As it stands, between their restricted free agents, trade acquisitions, and even their prospect pipeline, Sergachev is now Utah’s No. 1 pick. So they might be able to maximize his usage in a way that Tampa Bay hasn’t been able to.
The addition of Sergachev is even more interesting with Utah’s next move in mind: bringing in right-hander Marino.
Marino is an intriguing return candidate. He stalled in Pittsburgh after a promising start to his NHL career and then flourished in his first season in New Jersey. But he took a big step backward last season. Perhaps the loss of his go-to partner, Ryan Graves, had a bigger impact on his game than the Devils anticipated, or maybe the flaws in practice strategies wore him down. Either way, a fresh start could benefit him. Utah could either put him right into the minutes on the second pairing or pair him with Sergachev for a balanced top pairing. There are a lot of possibilities here, and Utah hasn’t bet too much on its assets to make these deals, given its pool of assets.
As for Marino and the Devils, from New Jersey’s perspective, this deal makes sense, especially if they want to sign a free agent like Brett Pesce. From a salary cap perspective, this deal had to happen. Two second-round picks aren’t a bad return, but it doesn’t do much for the team right now other than move the salary. But with Marino’s no-trade clause kicking in Monday, management may not have had time to find a more perfect return.
The Lightning faced a similar situation, with Sergachev’s no-trade clause also being activated on Monday. The objective of the Sergachev and Jeannot transactions seems clear: to free up capitalization space. With McDonagh returning, the Lightning have a second-pairing lefty, and $8.5 million is a steep price for a third-pairing defenseman if the idea was to keep Sergachev on his natural side. Still, it seems like management should have instead focused on where Erik Cernak’s salary is going, given his ceiling and how his playing style might age.
Moser should be a welcome addition to bolster the Lightning’s depth, which was their biggest weakness last year. He played tough minutes in Arizona without the best results, but he may not be as exposed to the Lightning.
We can’t give Tampa Bay an incomplete grade — that’s how these grades work now — but it’s hard to judge this in its entirety until we see what the Lightning do with that cap space. Is this enough to extend Stamkos? If not, could this help the team land another top scorer on the free agent market? If management fails to do something worthwhile regarding salary flexibility, Sergachev’s job will not age very well.
Category Utah: Unless
Lightning level: C-plus
Devils Note: B
(Photo by Mikhail Sergachev: Bruce Bennett / Getty Images)