Capitals’ Ivan Miroshnichenko’s agent working on finding trade

The Washington Capitals have one of the deepest forward groups in the NHL, and when a team has more than 12 quality forwards and has yet to run into sustained injury issues, someone has to sit in the press box or wait their turn in the AHL.

This year for the Capitals, that’s quite often been talented winger Ivan Miroshnichenko, who the Capitals chose with the No. 20 overall selection in the 2022 NHL Draft.

The Russian has 14 points in 55 career NHL games, and his agent Dan Milstein has been given permission to seek a trade to accommodate his desire for more playing time. On Wednesday, Milstein joined Jeff Marek and David Pagnotta on DFO Insider to shed some light on the situation.

“He’s a very good young player, very promising with superstar potential,” Milstein said. “Unfortunately, or fortunately for Washington, they have way too many guys, way too many bodies. And this season, he cannot be playing every single night… So as a result, we are looking for a home, working closely with the Washington Capitals, and hopeful that in the near future, he would be joining another team where he would have an opportunity to play in a top-six role.”

Fans hear pretty frequently about agents being given permission to seek a trade, but what does that actually look like in terms of the dialogue between an agent and general manager?

“As an agent, I have a good relationship with all of the general managers and teams. Sometimes… you have to fight. And five seconds later, you basically on the phone talk about a different client. So it’s kind of the relationship you have, right?

“So you speak to all the clubs. First of all, you identify the clubs where a client would have a potentially good opportunity, right? Because not every hockey player can play on any of the 32 clubs. So we find we have a list of teams where a preferred destination and or where a client could play and could have a very good opportunity. And you just start calling the general managers and start having conversations.

For Washington’s part, general manager Chris Patrick has acted quickly and often recently to do what he can to improve his team, both in terms of its ability to compete for the Stanley Cup now and set up for sustained success in the future.

“And sometimes the general manager, in this case, Chris Patrick, would send an email or would pick up the phone and call on some teams. We usually keep it all quiet under wraps. And people don’t know. Unfortunately, when there’s an email or a phone call that goes out to 31 other general managers, unfortunately, some of those guys, they like to leak a lot of information out.”

You can watch Milstein’s full interview and the rest of the episode below…