What is Brady Tkachuk’s future with the Senators?
Things are undoubtedly looking up with the Ottawa Senators. They have a young team that’s made the playoffs two years in a row, and should fit in right next to the Montreal Canadiens and Buffalo Sabres as up and coming squads poised to take over the Atlantic Division for the foreseeable future.
Call it small-market paranoia, but there’s one looming concern in Ottawa that seems to hang over an otherwise optimistic atmosphere. Captain Brady Tkachuk has two years left on his current contract, and there’s been speculation that the American-born power forward is waiting for his chance to end his time in Canada’s capital, whether it be to join his brother Matthew with the Florida Panthers or go somewhere else.
On Wednesday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, hosts Tyler Yaremchuk and Carter Hutton were joined by Brent Wallace to discuss Tkachuk’s future with the Senators.
Carter Hutton: I know there’s been a lot of hype about this post-Olympics with Brady Tkachuk. What’s your take on him and your feel for him in Ottawa as the leader? He obviously wears it on his sleeve with the way he plays, but there’s also a lot of talk about potentially these American players getting out of Canada.
Brent Wallace: I’ll start with saying I have not heard one word from either side that Brady Tkachuk wants out of Ottawa and doesn’t want to play here. Anything else outside of that is just noise. It’s never been mentioned anywhere that I’ve been around. That doesn’t say it hasn’t happened, I can just tell you I haven’t heard anything. There is a lot of noise around the U.S. players in Canada, but as far as I know he is fully committed to playing in Ottawa.
His deal is up not this year but the following year, so I don’t know where that plays out or how that plays out. It’s just an interesting dynamic of an added ripple to where this contract negotiation may end up going. We relate a lot to Matthew Tkachuk about it. I don’t know if it’s the same, I just know there’s an awful lot of noise around if Brady Tkachuk is happy in Ottawa. But again, nobody has said a word anywhere on either side that he wants to be gone.
You can catch the full discussion and the rest of Wednesday’s episode here…