The Rangers have traded center Kevin Hayes to the Jets in exchange for forward Brendan Lemieux, a 2019 first-round pick and a conditional draft pick, the team announced Monday. Details of the deal were first reported by TSN and The Athletic
For the conditional pick, New York will receive a 2022 fourth-round pick if Winnipeg wins the Stanley Cup. No other picks will be conveyed if the Jets don’t win it all.
Hayes, 26, has been one of the Rangers’ top forwards over the past few years. He’s on pace to set a career-high with 42 points through 51 games this season and provides the size (6’5, 216 pounds) that many teams covet in the postseason. The Jets clearly valued that because giving up a first-round pick is always a high price, even for a team that expects to select near the end of the round.
Blackhawks fans may remember Hayes because he was the team’s first-round pick (24th overall) in the 2010 draft. Hayes declined to sign with the Hawks after completing his college career at Boston College, however, and opted to sign with the Rangers as a free agent. As compensation for failing to sign their first-rounder, the Hawks received the 54th overall pick in the 2015 draft, which they used to select Graham Knott.
Lemieux, the son of longtime player Claude Lemieux, is in the middle of his first full NHL season. He recorded nine goals and two assists in 44 games with Jets. The Sabres originally drafted him with the 31st overall pick in the 2014 draft, and he was sent to the Jets as part of the deal that sent Evander Kane and Zach Bogosian to Buffalo.
Hayes has a $5.175 million cap hit and will become an unrestricted free agent in the offseason. The Jets now have just four picks in the upcoming draft.
