6 2025 Offseason Trade Landing Spots for Alexis Lafreniere Amid NHL Rumors

The 2024-25 season was a total mess and bitter disappointment for the New York Rangers, as they went from the Presidents' Trophy and Eastern Conference Finals to completely missing the playoffs in just one season.

Even if you conclude that the 2023-24 team was a flawed roster that overachieved and was not quite as good as its record, plenty had to go wrong for them to regress that badly.

One of the things that went wrong was a step backward for former No. 1 overall pick Alexis Lafreniere.

It continued the Rangers' recent struggles developing young forward talent, and has left the franchise and its young forward at a crossroads.

With the Rangers looking at an offseason of change, Lafreniere's name is already starting to surface in some trade speculation.

Practically speaking, trading Lafreniere would probably be a huge mistake. He will still be just 24 years old when this upcoming season begins, and he has shown enough flashes of being a top-line player that the Rangers should be doing everything in their power to try and extract that level of play out of him consistently. It also does not make sense to try and move him when his value has taken something of a hit.

But as long as the idea is being talked about, let's try and take a look at a handful of teams that could make sense as a potential landing spot if the Rangers were to try and move him.

If nothing else, these are teams that should at least be interested in trying to acquire him if the opportunity presents itself.

Montreal Canadiens

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Alexis Lafreniere

There are plenty of reasons why you could draw a line connecting the Canadiens and Lafreniere.

For one, Montreal's current president of hockey operations is Jeff Gorton, who was responsible for taking Lafreniere No. 1 overall when he was running the Rangers back in 2020.

Second, not only did Montreal take a huge step forward this season and get itself back into the playoffs, but it is also going to be in the market for another top-six winger option that can score.

At 24, Lafreniere would absolutely fit into the current core in Montreal and could still become an impact player alongside the likes of Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield.

The question comes down to what Montreal could or would realistically offer.

Could it be a situation where former No. 1 overall picks (Juraj Slafkovsky being the player for Montreal) get swapped? Would that even be worth it for either side? Slafkovsky is coming into his own with the Montreal core, and even if the Canadiens did have an interest in Lafreniere, they would probably like to have both players if they could.

Would the Rangers have an interest in some of Montreal's draft pick capital that includes 12 picks in this year's class, including two picks in each of the first four rounds? That might not be intriguing for a Rangers team that is looking to win right now.

There is not a great matchup in terms of assets, but Lafreniere is the type of player the Canadiens should be targeting, and the fact that there is a connection between their front office (Gorton) and the player would make it an intriguing possibility.

Calgary Flames

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When the 2024-25 season began, it looked like it was going to be a rebuilding year for the Calgary Flames, especially after they had traded away so many veteran players and pending free agents over the previous year-and-a-half.

Instead, the Flames ended up outperforming their preseason expectations and very nearly pulled off a surprising playoff berth.

If they are going to improve on that performance next season, they are going to have to do something about an offense that finished 29th in the NHL in goals scored.

The Flames are another team that has a ton of draft pick capital, owning multiple first-round picks in each of the next two draft classes.

This would also be an opportunity for a potential hockey-based trade that doesn't take into account future considerations or draft picks.

The Flames need offense.

The Rangers need defense.

Could something centered around, say, Rasmus Andersson be a starting point? Andersson is coming off a down year, but he was not quite 100 percent. Only having one year remaining on his contract is also not ideal, but we're just spitballing hypotheticals here and both teams have something that the other needs.

Utah Mammoth

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Utah should be one of the more aggressive teams in the NHL this offseason.

They made some big financial investments shortly after relocating from Arizona (acquiring Mikhail Sergachev and John Marino; extending Dylan Guenther) and, for the first time in years, have some actual hope that they might be able to build and sustain a competitive team.

They have solid ownership, a new and emerging fan base, and a pretty good young core of talent that just needs something to bring it all together. They also have the No. 4 pick in this year's draft after moving up from No. 14 in the lottery.

After making such a big investment in the defense last offseason, this offseason should put the focus on adding more impact talent at forward, especially since they have so much salary cap flexibility and are set to enter the offseason with over $20 million in space available.

Lafreniere would be a great addition to a young core of talent that already includes Clayton Keller, Logan Cooley and Guenther at the top of the lineup.

Anaheim Ducks

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Alexis Lafreniere

The Ducks have missed the postseason seven years in a row, but the 2024-25 season finally represented some sort of a step forward.

The Ducks flirted with the .500 mark, were the most competitive they have been at any point of this rebuild, and at least positioned themselves in a situation where a big offseason might get them back into the playoffs as early as this season.

That should, at the very least, be the goal for this offseason and upcoming season.

The Ducks have a strong farm system, plenty of young talent and enter the offseason swimming in salary cap space with a GM that already said the goal this offseason is going to be taking a big step forward to get better.

Given the Rangers' needs at center, it could also be an opportunity for Trevor Zegras to be involved and get a fresh start somewhere else after another disappointing season.

Chicago Blackhawks

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Alexis Lafreniere

It is time for the Blackhawks to take a serious step forward in their rebuild, because a repeat of 2024-25 can not be acceptable.

Even though expectations were low for the 2024-25 season, the Blackhawks still managed to fall short of them and ended up winning less games in the second year of Connor Bedard's career than they did in the season they tanked to try and secure him the top pick in the draft to acquire him.

That is not how the rebuild is supposed to go at this point.

The Blackhawks have a strong farm system and prospect pool, have more than $30 million in salary cap space at their disposal this offseason and desperately need a young winger that can be Bedard's linemate for the foreseeable future.

With Artyom Levshunov, Kevin Korchinski and Sam Rinzel at the top of their prospect ranking and farm system, Chicago is loaded with the type of defense prospects that could attract the Rangers and also serve as the necessary trade chips to help the Blackhawks land a potential top-line winger for their young franchise center.

Minnesota Wild

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Alexis Lafreniere

Here is the thought process for suggesting the Wild:

1) The Wild are going to have some actual salary cap flexibility to work with this summer for the first time in years, when the worst years of the Zach Parise and Ryan Suter buyouts are finally behind them.

2) They need some more scoring depth beyond their top offensive players. Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy are great, but they can not do it all by themselves.

3) They have a young center in Marco Rossi that is also the subject of trade rumors, given his contract situation and status as a pending restricted free agent.

4) The Rangers need another young, potential impact center down the middle of their lineup, given that Mika Zibanejad, J.T. Miller and Vincent Trocheck are all on the wrong side of 30, and are all already showing signs of significantly slowing down.

Could that sort of swap be a potential starting point? The Wild would get a young, potential top-six scorer who is already signed long-term. The Rangers would get a potential impact scorer at center whose best days are still ahead of him.

There would be an issue with the Rangers getting Rossi signed to a new deal, but if they are flipping Lafreniere's contract, and if they can potentially find a taker for somebody like Chris Kreider or Zibanejad, the salary cap space should, in theory, be there.