Teemu Selanne will be returning for an 18th NHL season with the Anaheim Ducks. He told a Finnish sports magazine that he expected a deal to be done with the Ducks within the next couple of days.

What’s more, Selanne says that he’s made a pitch to the club to bring his old pal Paul Kariya back into the fold. “I’ve talked to Paul and the Ducks. Paul has been waiting for my decision and I hope things move forward,” he said.

Selanne’s exact wording to Sports Journal was that he’d return for “at least another year.” This will mark his 12th season with the Ducks and Anaheim is proving to be a franchise that the Finnish player believes in.

In 54 games last season, Selanne managed 21 goals and 48 points. He’s proven that he can still impress and be valuable on the ice, so his presence with the club will certainly continue to elevate the proceedings.

The Ducks look like they’re gearing up nicely for another year, too. With the signings of Andy Sutton, Toni Lydman and Saku Koivu, they’re into giving Selanne a lot to play with. And if Kariya ends up part of the team, so much the better for Ducks fans.

Ageists are quick to point to the fact that the Ducks look to be building a team around older guys, but Selanne, Koivu and Kariya still possess high levels of skill and boast conditioning that the NHL’s younger players would struggle to keep up with. If the Ducks can pull this off, they could have a good-looking second line to charge into the new season with.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

Andy Sutton has signed a two year contract with the Anaheim Ducks. The deal is worth $4.25 million and will help the Ducks fill in some gaps on the blueline.

The Ducks have been looking to replace the retired Scott Niedermayer and the traded James Wisniewski, so Sutton’s a nice fit for the price. At 35, he brings veteran skill and presence as well.

Sutton is a shot-blocking machine, ranking second among all players with 204. He’s also known for his hitting prowess, finishing eighth among defencemen with 197 hits in the regular season. Sutton saw 72 games of action last season with the New York Islanders and Ottawa Senators and many thought that he’d remain in the nation’s capital for a spell.

The Ducks had their eye on Sutton from the start of the free agency period, though, and wound up landing him in the end after several teams gave the big defenceman some looks. Sutton had even moved his family to Los Angeles’ Manhattan Beach area, so the fit is a good one.

“We’re definitely making the move out here more long-term,” Sutton said. “Everything came together, and now we don’t have to leave.”

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

Scott Niedermayer is ready to leave hockey on top of the world. Just four months after helping Team Canada seal the deal with Olympic gold, the superstar defenceman is hanging up his skates for good.

The Anaheim Duck will be finishing off an 18-year career in style, going out after winning four Stanley Cups and a small pile of medals and trophies. He now says that he’s “100% committed” to his decision to retire.

The plan currently is for Niedermayer to stick around the Ducks organization as a consultant to GM Bob Murray, continuing to help a team that he pulled out of obscurity upon his arrival. Niedermayer, together with Chris Pronger, helped Anaheim to its Cup victory in 2007 by logging nearly 30 minutes a game and finishing up with a Conn Smythe for his efforts.

He’s come a long way from his time on the New Jersey Devils, too. Niedermayer came into the league with a lot of hype and he earned every bit of it, controlling the New Jersey blueline with the elegant grace of a seasoned veteran.

Niedermayer will be remembered as a pure powerplay quarterback and as a class act. He helped both the Ducks and Devils motivate their defensive groupings from the back and helped control the offense at the same time, proving his versatility every single game. The fact that he has only missed the NHL playoffs twice as a player is a testament to his skill and leadership.

For the Ducks, the problem is not only an emotional one but a practical one. How will they cope with losing two star defenders in two years? How will they rebuild from having two of the best players leave the fold in relative succession? The torch will be passed, that’s for sure, and it’ll be time for youngsters to step up.

Even though his departure leaves a significant hole behind, Niedermayer’s loyalty will never be in doubt. Whether skating smoothly in a Team Canada jersey or a Ducks sweater, he’ll always be remembered as one of the finest defenceman in hockey’s modern era and a surefire entry to the Hall of Fame.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

Teemu Selanne made history in scoring his 600th career goal tonight. He became the 18th player in National Hockey League history to net 600 goals and reached the marker in Sunday’s 5-2 victory over the Colorado Avalanche.

The Anaheim Duck forward becomes just the third European-born player to join the 600-goal club. Jari Kurri and Jaromir Jagr are the others. Selanne is fourth player to reach the milestone in the last four seasons. Jagr, Joe Sakic and Brendan Shanahan also became recent 600-goal scorers.

Selanne’s first NHL goal came against San Jose’s Jeff Hackett on Oct. 8, 1992.

Selanne’s impact was felt almost immediately upon his arrival in the league. He was a high-flying member of the Winnipeg Jets. Taken 10th overall pick in the 1988 draft, made a splash by scoring 76 goals in his rookie season and tying Alex Mogilny for the league lead. Selanne took the Calder Trophy with ease and finished with 110 points, breaking Peter Stastny’s rookie record.

Selanne’s is a 10-time All-Star and won the first two Rocket Richard trophies for top goal-scorer - 1997-98 (52) and 1998-99 (47).

It took until 2007 for him to hoist his first Stanley Cup, however.

Winning it with the Ducks was an amazing experience and Selanne has remained a fixture on the roster, but this season will probably be his last. He missed the first 17 games of the year with a broken hand and a fractured jaw caused him to miss another seven.

With 600 goals and 647 career assists to date, Teemu Selanne is one of the NHL’s elite players. The Finnish Flash is always a treat to watch and he has to be a shoe-in for the Hall of Fame.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

The National Hockey League has sent a message to James Wisniewski by suspending him for eight games following his hit on Chicago’s Brent Seabrook.

The suspension is the longest one of this season and can be viewed as the NHL making an example out of Wisniewski. The Anaheim Duck defenceman apologized for the hit but felt that the suspension was too harsh a punishment.

Wisniewski hit Seabrook, who didn’t have the puck, up high and drove him into the boards.

This is Wisniewski’s second suspension of the season, with his first coming after hitting Shane Doan in the head with his forearm on November 2.

Ducks general manager Bob Murray seemed to have no problem with the suspension, but did quibble with the length of it. “In this instance, he crossed the line. He went too far and I applaud the league for cracking down on these things. The only problem I have is the length of it. It just seems that Wis, at this point, because of the climate of the league, is an easy target,” he said.

Seabrook is the second Chicago defenceman to be put on the shelf lately, with Brian Campbell knocked out for the remainder of the season thanks to the infamous Alex Ovechkin hit on Sunday.

Blackhawks head coach Joel Quenneville was more than upset about the play. “There are certain hits in the game that are tolerable if you got the puck,” Quenneville said after the 4-2 loss at Anaheim. “But if you hit a guy without the puck, you could kill a guy. It’s the most dangerous hit in the history of the game. He tried to hurt him. If that’s not intent, that’s as bad a hit as you can ever have in the game.”

Quenneville’s comments were taken by Wisniewski to mean that his particular hit was the most dangerous hit in the history of the game, but I don’t think that’s what the coach was getting at. Instead, I think Quenneville was referencing hits on players who don’t have the puck - period.

In that respect, those hits are the most dangerous in the history of the NHL and of the game and they represent exactly why the league’s ruling on blindside hits needs to be implemented as soon as possible.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

The Edmonton Oilers have moved a significant contract today in shifting Lubomir Visnovsky over to the Anaheim Ducks in exchange for Ryan Whitney.

The deal unpacks some space from the Oilers roster and enables them to get a skilled defenceman in return. Both players in this deal were Olympians, too, and it stands at this point as the biggest trade of trade deadline day.

Whitney was selected as a replacement to the injured Mike Komisarek to play on the American men’s Olympic team, while Visnovsky suited up for the Slovaks and has quite a history of international play.

It’s a trade that gives the Ducks a puck-moving offensively-minded defenceman to work with their talent and it allows the Oilers to move in a nice direction with a skilled defenceman of their own.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

The Anaheim Ducks have traded goalie Vesa Toskala to the Calgary Flames in exchange for goalie Curtis McElhinney.

With the recent moves made by Darryl Sutter in Calgary, the team is certainly starting to look like the Toronto of the Western Conference. This deal, together with a contract extension offered to Matt Stajan, may make the Red Mile look an awful lot like Yonge Street.

The Ducks were probably never all that serious about Toskala, what with Hiller doing well in goal, and this is a pretty routine move for the club.

In any event, this deal doesn’t really boost Calgary’s profile at all. Toskala will have to sit on the bench behind Kiprusoff an awful lot and it doesn’t seem like a smart move in regards to salary, but maybe Sutter has something up his sleeve here before the day is out.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

Brian Burke has officially begun the process of retooling the Toronto Maple Leafs. Within a few hours, the Leafs GM made some big moves and transformed the entire landscape of his hockey club.

A seven player deal kicked things off with a bang, as the Leafs acquired Calgary’s Dion Phaneuf, Fredrik Sjostrom and Keith Aulie in exchange for Ian White, Niklas Hagman, Matt Stajan and Jamal Mayers. The deal was announced just hours after the Leafs dropped its fifth consecutive loss after coughing up a 3-0 lead to Vancouver.

For his part, Phaneuf was in shock. “I know that’s a cliche … If Wayne Gretzky can get traded, anyone can get traded,” he said. “I was very surprised but on the other hand, I’m very excited to be going to the biggest hockey market in the world. I talked to them this morning and I’m very excited to be a Toronto Maple Leaf and getting there.”

Phaneuf is certainly the key component to the deal and his arrival in Toronto will certainly reconfigure the defensive core of the team. He adds toughness and will anchor the club defensively, showing an edge of grit that should set a nice tone for the rest of the Leafs’ defenders.

But Burke wasn’t finished…

Hours later, Burke closed another trade that saw goalie Vesa Toskala and Jason Blake head to Anaheim in exchange for Jean-Sebastien Giguere. The deal brings Giguere that starting job he wanted in Anaheim and gives him some motivation to play hard. It also provides Toronto’s Jonas Gustavsson with a solid mentor figure.

“J.S. is as classy and professional as they come,” Ducks general manager Bob Murray said in a statement. “On behalf of the organization, we thank him for his tremendous contributions to the franchise both on and off the ice, not the least of which were two trips to the Stanley Cup Final and one championship. We wish him well in Toronto.”

So will the changes help the Leafs? Will the changes help the Flames?

There’s no question that Toronto has some pretty significant build blocks to work with. They also dumped off some dead weight and cleared some salary cap room by moving disappointing players like Blake.

Burke comes out the winner with the best players in the deals, too, and Phaneuf is a huge acquisition for his hockey team. The Leafs are still right up against the cap, sure, but Burke probably dodged a few bullets by ditching the White contract’s expected raise. Hagman, too, had two more years to go on a $3 million price tag and was starting to look every bit his 35 years of age.

Brian Burke has finally gotten the ball rolling in T-Dot. Is he finished? Only time will tell, but these moves are significant enough to show that the GM has finally gotten serious about making big changes to his hockey club. Nobody is safe.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

First the Anaheim Ducks have had to deal with word that their goaltender, J.S. Giguere, was unhappy. The rumours are starting again this week, with rumblings that defenceman Scott Niedermayer might be looking for a way out, too.

With the Ducks sitting near the basement of the Western Conference and with Niedermayer certainly not getting any younger, some are starting to suggest that the defender might be willing to move to a team like the New Jersey Devils.

When asked about a potential trade, Niedermayer was honest: “I think it’s a possibility. Last year we were kind of in a situation where we were teetering and there was some talk and rumors. You start to think about it. But I’m not thinking about that right now. Our goal right now is to do well on this road trip, to play good hockey and get into the playoff picture and compete with this team. When those bridges come, I’ll deal with them.”

Niedermayer currently sits on the Ducks with a one-year contract worth $6 million. He does not have a no-trade clause.

“If the team came to me, they’d be free to do what they wanted. I don’t have a no-trade,” he said. “We’re still a ways from there. When the time comes, hopefully we’ll be in the playoffs and ready to compete for the Stanley Cup.”

The Devils would have to be the frontrunners for Niedermayer’s services at this point. Before he signed with the Ducks for this season, the New Jersey club was interested and Lou Lamoriello did inquire as to the possibility. Some are speculating that Niedermayer might be game for joining his brother Rob on the Devils for one last run with his old club before retirement.

“Obviously I was with (Devils head coach) Jacques (Lemaire) here for quite a long time and had some success here. He’s a good coach,” Niedermayer said. “So I’m not surprised to see where those guys are. They’re a good hockey club and Jacques is a great coach.”

Whether there are moves in the air remains to be seen, of course, but I wouldn’t be too surprised if the Ducks started making some major shifts to recover at least some of the current season. It may be time for a shake-up in Anaheim and moving Niedermayer might just be the type of thing to change fortunes for the team.

Posted by Jordan Richardson.

It looks like goaltender J.S. Giguere is getting restless with the situation in Anaheim. The Ducks keeper is not at all pleased with his playing situation, said the Los Angeles Daily News, and if things don’t get better soon he’ll be looking for other options.

According to the paper, Giguere said that he’d “rather retire than be a backup goalie.”

“Something needs to happen,” Giguere told the paper. “You get a guy like (Hiller) that’s going to be a free agent at the end of the year and myself, making the money I’m making, either I’m leaving or he’s leaving.”

Giguere is set to make $13 million over the next two years and simple math tells us that he’s right as rain with his assessment. Hiller, 27, is going to make $1.3 million in the final year of his contract and all signs suggest that the Ducks will look to lock him up to a more significant deal.

Sources have said that Giguere has presented Ducks management with a list of teams that he’d accept a move to in the off-season and that he may be prepared to waive his no-trade clause in order to get something done. It appears that ice time is the major issue here and that Giguere is not pleased with splitting duties with Hiller.

“I want to play; that’s when I have fun. Right now, this is not fun,” Giguere told the paper. “I am looking forward to having fun at some point at some time. I’m not sure what’s going to happen, but it’s going to happen.”

Posted by Jordan Richardson.