On Monday, the Anaheim Ducks traded Trevor Zegras to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for Ryan Pohling, a 2025 second-round pick (45th overall), and a 2026 fourth-round pick.

Zegras’ time in Anaheim was electric from the first time he stepped onto the ice wearing a Ducks sweater. Still, a strenuous contract negotiation and two injury-riddled seasons later, Zegras is a member of the Flyers.

Ducks Trade Trevor Zegras to the Flyers

Here’s a timeline of Zegras’ tenure as a member of the  Anaheim Ducks:

2019 Draft

The Ducks select Trevor Zegras with the ninth overall pick in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft.

2019-20 Season

Zegras plays his freshman season at Boston University, scoring 36 points (11-25=36) in 33 games.

He represents the United States at the 2020 World Junior Championship, scoring nine points (all assists) in five games.

Zegras signs his ELC on March 27, 2020

2020-21 Season

Zegras again represents the United States at the 2021 World Junior Championship, winning a gold medal and tournament MVP honors with a whopping 18 points (7-11=18) in seven games.

He joins the San Diego Gulls following World Juniors and scores nine points (4-5=9) in eight games.

He’s called up to the Ducks for his NHL debut and scores seven points (1-6=7) in 17 games before rejoining the Gulls in a reported transaction to move him back to his natural center position.

He scores 12 points (6-6=12) in his next nine AHL games and is recalled to the NHL.

He finishes the regular season with six points (2-4=6) in his next seven NHL games and is returned to the AHL for their playoffs, where he scores three points (1-2=3) in three games.

2021-22 Season

Zegras electrifies in his first full NHL season, his rookie campaign, becoming a human highlight reel, earning an invite to the NHL All-Star Game as a guest in the shootout competition and a spot as a co-cover athlete on EA Sports’ “NHL 23” video game.

He was the runner-up for the Calder Trophy, totalling 61 points (23-38=61) in 75 games.

2022-23 Season

Zegras leads the Ducks in scoring in his sophomore season, the Ducks' worst season in franchise history, with 65 points (23-42=65) in 81 games.

2023 Offseason

Zegras is an RFA, as his ELC expires. A publicly difficult negotiation plays out well into the Ducks’ notably intense 2023 training camp, Greg Cronin’s first as head coach after his hiring in June.

He signs a three-year bridge deal that carries an AAV of $5.75 million on Oct 2, 2023, and sustains a groin injury attempting to catch up to speed halfway through camp.

2023-24 Season

Zegras attempts to play through injury early in the season while rounding out his two-way game, but is forced out of the lineup to recover after only producing three points (1-2=3) in 12 games.

He returns to the lineup in late December and tallies five points (3-2=5) in eight games before sustaining a broken ankle.

During his absence, the Ducks trade Jamie Drysdale and a 2025 second-round pick to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for Cutter Gauthier. Zegras’ name pops up on trade boards due to speculation, citing the aforementioned contract negotiation and a potential stylistic mismatch between him and Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek.

He returns in late March and finishes the season with a total of 15 points (6-9=15) in 31 games, including eight points (2-6=8) in his final eight games.

After the season, he represents the United States at the World Championships, disappointingly scoring three points (1-2=3) in eight games.

2024-25 Season

Zegras and the Ducks get off to a slow start to the season, but his play is praised by Cronin and Verbeek for his commitment to both sides of the puck and in all three zones.

He tears his meniscus in early December and ultimately misses 25 games due to injury in 2024-25. He finishes the year with a total of 32 points (12-20=32) in 57 games.

2025 Offseason

Zegras is traded to Philadelphia.

Conclusion

The decline in Zegras’ production and value can be traced back to his contract negotiations in the summer of 2023. A coach was hired who demanded a different level of commitment to defense than Zegras had been accustomed to and capable of. Despite his best efforts, he was never able to deliver what was asked, and in trying to accomplish it, his offensive game and his body took significant hits.

Zegras will look to recover his production displayed early in his career, as he’s still one of the most deceptive, creative, and offensively gifted players in the NHL.

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The Anaheim Ducks have traded center Trevor Zegras to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for forward Ryan Poehling, the 45th pick in the 2025 NHL Draft and a 2026 fourth-rounder. The Athletic reported the trade on Monday after sources from both teams confirmed the transaction.

Zegras has long been rumored to be a trade candidate after tallying 12 goals and 20 assists in the 2024-25 season. Aside from the Flyers, the New York Rangers were also a rumored candidate to trade for the 24-year-old, per The Hockey News. Poehling had nearly identical numbers with 12 goals and 19 assists in his sixth NHL season. 

The Ducks selected Zegras with the ninth pick in the 2019 NHL Draft. He has since scored 67 goals and 112 assists for 186 points in his 268 NHL games. 

The draft pick acquired by the Ducks on Monday originally belonged to the Columbus Blue Jackets, who originally traded it to the Flyers in a three-team swap in 2023 that also involved the Los Angeles Kings. 

Monday's trade is the second major exchange between the Ducks and Flyers in two years after the Flyers traded prospect Cutter Gauthier to Anaheim for Jamie Drysdale and a second-round pick in 2024. 

The Ducks finished with a 35-7 record this past season, while the Flyers went 33-39.  

The first big deal of the 2025 NHL offseason saw the Philadelphia Flyers trade center Ryan Poehling, the 45th pick in the 2025 NHL Draft, and a fourth-round pick to the Anaheim Ducks for forward Trevor Zegras.

The Flyers are buying low on a supremely talented player in Zegras, a former No. 11 pick, who has scored just 18 goals and 47 points in only 88 games across the last two seasons.

Zegras, 24, has been hampered by a variety of injuries in recent seasons, including a broken left ankle suffered last January. At his best, though, the 6-foot forward is a versatile, skillful agitator who scored north of 60 points in each of his first two full seasons in the NHL.

The Flyers, desperate for centers and talented left-shot wingers, will be happy to take the risk on Zegras, who was being sold extremely low by the Ducks.

In his NHL career, Zegras has played left wing, center, and right wing, though the context of this Flyers trade suggests he'll be playing center.

It can be safely presumed that Zegras is now the primary running mate for star sophomore Matvei Michkov, giving the Flyers at least three forward duos they can rely on: Zegras and Michkov, Sean Couturier and Travis Konecny, and Tyson Foerster and Noah Cates.

The flexibility Zegras brings with his positional versatility is key, as it allows the Flyers to choose whoever they want with the No. 6 pick in the 2025 draft without thinking too much about long-term ramifications.

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Playmaking centers like James Hagens and Jake O'Brien work equally as well as a cerebral sniper like Porter Martone; Zegras is now the chess piece the Flyers can move around freely.

Grade: A

This trade was a slam dunk for Danny Briere's first transaction of the offseason. The Flyers badly needed some fresh faces and, more than anything else, a higher floor and a higher ceiling offensively.

It would be dishonest to say that Ryan Poehling isn't a loss for the Flyers, too. Indeed, Poehling is on the last year of his contract and effectively a fourth-line center, but he is capable of playing up and down the lineup in a pinch, skates like the wind, works hard, and kills penalties.

Centers like Poehling are valuable in the NHL, but the Ducks got one from the Flyers at a cost that many wouldn't agree with.

Reiterating the assumption that Zegras plays center for the Flyers, Philadelphia's immediate center depth will consist of Zegras, Couturier, and Cates with someone like Jett Luchanko, Karsen Dorwart, Rodrigo Abols, or perhaps a free agent signing slotting in behind them.

It should be noted that Zegras, like Poehling, is in the last year of his contract, but will instead be an RFA at the end of the season. The former top Ducks draft pick carries a salary of $5.75 million, which is no issue given the Flyers have $15 million in cap space still remaining.

To earn any kind of substantial raise, Zegras will assuredly have to return to his 60-point form, if not better.

Looking ahead to the 2025 draft later this week, the Flyers still have six picks in the first two rounds, including all three of their first-round picks.

This is key, as acquiring that high-upside talent in Zegras leaves the Flyers with their best trade assets still in hand. Or, they could simply use those picks on prospects. The choice is theirs.

In the second round, the Flyers still own the 36th, 40th, and 48th picks.

With previous rumors surrounding defensemen like Nicolas Hague and Alexander Romanov, as well as the persisting talk around prized KHL free agent Maxim Shabanov, look for the Flyers to remain busy and active over the next several days.

The Trevor Zegras era in Anaheim has come to a close. On Monday, he was traded to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for forward Ryan Poehling, the 45th overall pick in the 2025 NHL Draft and a 2026 fourth-round pick.

“While this was a difficult trade to make, we have and will continue to look at retooling our roster over the next couple of months,” Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek said in a team statement. This transaction is part of that process. We wish Trevor the best of luck with the Flyers.” Verbeek also thanked Zegras for his contributions and efforts over the last six seasons.

On the surface, this trade comes at a strange time. Zegras’ trade value had plummeted after two difficult seasons under Greg Cronin, not to mention long-term injuries curtailing both of those seasons. The offensive production wasn’t consistent, but there were signs that he was capable of getting back to the 60-plus point campaigns he’d had as a rookie and sophomore in the NHL.

With one year remaining on the three-year contract he’d signed after a contract dispute in 2023, Zegras was likely on the outside looking in when it came to receiving an extension beyond his current deal. He had been shifted to the wing after coming into the league as a natural center and his limited deployment on the power play suggested that he did not figure into Anaheim’s long-term plans.

“When the players are in those circumstances, we all take everything year-by-year,” Verbeek said when asked in April about Zegras and pending UFA Jacob Trouba fitting into the organization long-term. “I’m certainly going to be watching to see how each of them perform and take in the whole course of the season to decide where we go. They’re obviously quality hockey players. We’ve got a lot of quality hockey players in our system, so there’s going to be a lot of things that are going happen and we’ll have to be able to figure that out and assess that at the appropriate time.”

Joel Quenneville’s hiring as head coach this past May suggested that Zegras may get an opportunity to play in the NHL under a head coach who knows how to utilize him properly. Comparisons to how Patrick Kane, a player who Zegras looks up to, was deployed in Chicago came to mind.

Chris Kreider, one of Zegras’ good friends, was also acquired by the Ducks via trade earlier in June, further suggesting that a better environment was being put in place for the former ninth overall pick.

Instead, that will come in Philadelphia with the Flyers under new head coach Rick Tocchet. Zegras reunites with good friend and former roommate, Jamie Drysdale, who was traded to the Flyers in Jan. 2024 for Cutter Gauthier and a second-round pick.

Poehling has one year remaining on the contract he signed with the Flyers in Jan. 2024, which carries a $1.9 million cap hit. A collegiate star at St. Cloud State, Poehling was drafted 25th overall in the 2017 NHL Draft by the Montréal Canadiens but has found it difficult to lock down an everyday role in the NHL.

He seemed to have found a home in Philadelphia after a short stop in Pittsburgh following his departure from the Canadiens, setting career-highs in points in both of his seasons in the City of Brotherly Love.

In Anaheim, Poehling will likely fill a bottom-6 role, as he’s done over the past few seasons for the Penguins and Flyers. He has some edge to his game and could see time on the penalty kill. He had three shorthanded goals in 2023-24.

Swapping Zegras for Poehling-plus gives the Ducks some wiggle room financially—not that they need it very much right now. But with the ability to sign players like Leo Carlsson, Jackson LaCombe and Cutter Gauthier to contract extensions on Jul. 1 and Mason McTavish and Lukáš Dostál needing new deals this offseason, something was always going to have to give. 

For the Flyers, it gives them a chance to see what Zegras can do—likely at center—before it comes time to extend him. A fan favorite in Anaheim, Zegras’ eventual return to Honda Center will be highly anticipated.

Featured image caption: Apr 7, 2025; Anaheim, California, USA; Anaheim Ducks center Trevor Zegras (11) during the second period at Honda Center. Mandatory Credit: Gary A. Vasquez-Imagn Images