The Pittsburgh Penguins are acquiring forward Yegor Chinakhov from the Columbus Blue Jackets in exchange for two draft picks, according to league sources. It wasn’t immediately clear what picks were made part of the deal because the trade call with the NHL was still pending.
The trade of Chinakhov was long anticipated, as he had requested a trade from Columbus in the offseason. The 24-year-old was the Blue Jackets’ first-round pick at No. 21 in 2020, but despite several flashes — five-to-10 game stretches where he looked like a productive top-six winger — he could never sustain the success, perhaps because of injuries.
Chinakhov has six points in 29 games this season as the Blue Jackets played him on every line. He started the season as a healthy scratch, then played out of place on the fourth line for a long stretch at the start of the season. When the Blue Jackets lost captain Boone Jenner to injury, Chinakhov got a shot on the second line. When Kirill Marchenko went down, he got a look on the first line. But he could never quite play well enough this season to grab hold of a top job.
Chinakhov’s best season was 2023-24, when he scored 16-13-29 in 53 games. But there were times, certainly at the start of last season, when he looked like the Blue Jackets’ most dangerous forward, combining his speed to open ice and an elite-level shot.
He drew the ire of the Blue Jackets last season, which was plagued by a back injury that Chinakhov could not get treated to his satisfaction. During the 4 Nations Face-Off, he returned to Russia to have a procedure done on his back that the Blue Jackets’ team doctors would not approve.
When he returned later that season, the Blue Jackets were in a playoff hunt — they missed by two points — and Chinakhov was having trouble keeping pace. He was a healthy scratch for several games down the stretch.
Blue Jackets GM Don Waddell has been willing to trade him all season, but his demand in return was a roster player who could help the Blue Jackets. That’s obviously changed, perhaps because the Blue Jackets added an NHL player, Mason Marchment, last week in a trade with the Seattle Kraken.
It was no surprise that Waddell would trade Chinakhov. The only surprise is that he traded him to a division rival.
This story will be updated.