Latest news with #MattKeator
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
Former Devils Defenseman Signs With New Team
A former New Jersey Devils third-round pick has taken his game overseas. Defenseman Reilly Walsh has signed overseas, per his agent Matt Keator. The 26-year-old has signed a contract with the Barys Astana of the KHL after five seasons in the American Hockey League (AHL). He most recently played for the Ontario Reign, where he collected 32 points in 70 games.
Yahoo
10-07-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Agent uses Brad Marchand example for Chris Kreider after trade from Rangers: ‘change can be refreshing'
When selling Chris Kreider on the benefits of being traded by the New York Rangers to the Anaheim Ducks, agent Matt Keator came up with a very timely comparison how Brad Marchand is flourishing now with the Florida Panthers after 16 seasons with the Boston Bruins. After more than a decade playing for one team in the same city with the same routines and comfort level, change can definitely be a positive thing. Advertisement 'I actually used Brad Marchand as an example of a guy who, hey, change is good. Change can be refreshing for a player. I think in Chris' case, it's going to be very refreshing,' Keator told hosts Pierre McGuire and Jimmy Murphy on The Sick Podcast. 'He's going to have five and a half months between his last hockey game to his next hockey game, and he's utilized the time, all the time, to prepare his body and mentally get ready for the season. I think he's going to have a great year.' The Rangers traded Kreider to the Ducks last week for 20-year-old center prospect Carey Terrance and a swap of mid-round draft picks. Most importantly, Anaheim picked up the remaining $13 million owed Kreider over the next two seasons, giving New York a much-needed $6.5 million more in salary-cap space. 'The math didn't add up in New York, and it was time [to move on],' Keator said simply. Of course, moving on after 13 seasons with the same organization is not exactly easy. But, hey, as Keator pointed out, look at Marchand, who spent 16 seasons with the Bruins, won the Stanley Cup with them in 2011 and was their captain the past two seasons. Marchand gave everything he had to the Bruins, but was dealt to the Panthers ahead of the trade deadline in March amid a terrible season for them and with the 37-year-old set to become an unrestricted free agent. Advertisement And how's that working out for Marchand? Well, in case you missed it, after recovering from an injury late in the season, he's living his best life in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Marchand is tied for third among all skaters with 10 goals in the postseason, and is the first player since Esa Tikkanen with the Edmonton Oilers in 1988 to score six goals in the Stanley Cup Final. Marchand and the Panthers are one victory away from winning the Stanley Cup, with Game 6 against the Oilers set for Tuesday at Amerant Bank Arena. So, change doesn't have to suck, does it? Related: Rangers rumors: Mika Zibanejad trade speculation picks up after Chris Kreider deal Ducks 'poised to win, and Chris wants to win,' agent says about former Rangers star Brad Penner-Imagn Images Of course, there's no guarantee that Kreider will be in the Cup Final next spring with the Ducks. In fact, you'd expect he won't be. The Ducks haven't made the playoffs in seven straight years. But with an extremely talented young core, paired with key veterans like Kreider, and three-time Stanley Cup winner Joel Quenneville now behind the bench, the Ducks are coming fast and should challenge for a postseason berth next season after they improved 21 points year-over-year in 2024-25. Advertisement It'll also be a fresh start for the 34-year-old forward, who dipped to 30 points this past season with the Rangers, despite finishing third on the team with 22 goals. 'Obviously, things in Anaheim have really changed for the better with Joel Quenneville going there and what (general manager) Pat Verbeek's done there. And they're poised to win, and Chris wants to win,' Keator explained. Kreider took his time examining the situation in Anaheim, which was included on his no-trade list, before signing off on this deal. He spoke to former Rangers teammates Jacob Trouba, Ryan Strome and Frank Vatrano, who all play for the Ducks. And Keator had Kreider speak with two of his clients that are with the Ducks, veteran forward Alex Killorn and emerging star Leo Carlsson. He also spoke with Quenneville. Advertisement Clearly, Kreider liked what he heard. 'He had great chemistry with Strome in New York, and off ice with Trouba and Frankie Vatrano. I think for him it was learning more, educating himself,' Keator stated. 'We did a zoom call … and [the Ducks] did a good job outlining where they are at, and they're in a win-now mode. Joel made a real good point on the call that that where they're at now reminds him of the [Chicago] Blackhawks in '08. If you remember, they won in 2010. It was quick. It was two years later and they were off to the races, and that's what this team has.' It might sear the eyeballs seeing Kreider in that bright orange Ducks jersey. And there will be other things for the popular former Rangers star to get accustomed to. Advertisement But change most definitely can be a good thing. Just ask Brad Marchand. Related Headlines
Boston Globe
24-06-2025
- Sport
- Boston Globe
Former captain Zdeno Chara, in first year of eligibility, joins long list of Bruins greats in the Hockey Hall of Fame
The son of an Olympic Greco-Roman wrestler, the Slovak-born Chara went from the near-anonymity of being an Islanders third-pound pick in 1996, to crafting an illustrious, oft-intimidating career in which he also amassed 2,085 penalty minutes. Though he preferred not to fight, in part because it played into a stereotype that he felt diminished his talents, he was a frightening force amid the battle, easily overwhelming opponents with his long reach, wrestler's iron clenches, and a heavyweight's punches. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up 'Bruins fans will love him,' offered his agent, Matt Keator, the day his client signed in Boston as a free agent in July 2006. 'He's a killing machine.' Advertisement That intimidation factor indeed played heavily in Chara's favor, and served as protection for the entire bench. But he was much more than a strongman. He was a powerful, durable, and prolific force throughout his career, his longest run with the Bruins, spanning 14 seasons and 1,023 regular-season games, as well as 150 more in the postseason, when he helped lead the Bruins three times to the Cup Final. Advertisement In the spring of 2011, the first of those trips to the Cup Final, the Bruins won what today stands as their lone title over the last 53 years. An exhausted Chara eagerly collected the Cup from NHL commissioner Gary Bettman near center ice that night in Vancouver and, standing a full 7 feet on skates, the bearded behemoth shook the shiny mug high over his head with such a vigor that he all but poked a hole in the roof of Rogers Arena. 'It's a huge honor,' Chara said on the ice that night 14 years ago. 'I'm so humbled to be in this position. It was so hard, such a long road, such a grind. I'm so happy for everyone to be able to cherish this moment. I will never forget this.' As a kid in Trencin, where coaches often insisted he was better suited for basketball, a frustrated Chara was repeatedly cut from his amateur hockey teams or denied promotion to better squads. When drafted by the Islanders, basically as a curiosity, he had but his size, strength, and fearsome fighting skills as his potential ticket to an NHL career. In a league trending more to skill than power and strength, his odds of making it appeared slim. Yet Chara opted to move (technically defect) to North America — eschewing Slovakia's mandatory military service — and stuffed all of his belongings into one suitcase as he made his way on a flight out of Bratislava to western Canada, at the invite of the WHL Prince George Cougars. It all could have ended there, before it even started. Advertisement 'I wasn't going back,' Chara recalled years later, explaining why he had brought so little with him on his journey. 'I had big hope.' By Nov. 19, 1997, barely more than a year since leaving his homeland, he slipped into the lineup of the Rick Bowness-coached Islanders, logging 7:03 of ice time in a 3-2 win at Detroit. Almost 25 years later, he skated in his final game, April 29, 2022, scoring a goal (No. 209) for the Islanders in a 6-4 loss to the Lightning in Elmont, N.Y. What carried him through all of it was a near-mythical off-ice training and nutrition regimen that Chara began to craft in his teens under the watch of his father Zdenek. By his father's telling, his son sat down with him one day at the kitchen table for a lesson in visual and life arts. Dad drew a train, noting his son that day was in the last car. Listen to me and train with me, dedicate yourself to hard work, his father said, and you'll move up and one day drive the train. 'But get off,' he told his son, pointing to the drawing on the kitchen table, 'and the train leaves.' Zdeno remained aboard for the full ride, training not at a state-of-the art gym or nearby fitness club, but in the family's backyard. There was yardwork to do, mowing and weeding and gardening. Zdeno did all of it, while routinely stopping, per his father's direction, in basic workout stations his father created among the trees and flower beds. Advertisement 'Obstacle courses around the garden, and I was grateful for it,' Chara said recently. 'Every time I went by and was watering the garden, or raking, or cutting grass, mowing the lawn, whatever we were doing, I was doing pushups or pullups or dips or squats. It adds up. You wouldn't believe it, at end of the day. You wouldn't feel like you did, I know how many, 50 or 70 or 80 pullups. But by end of day, you're like, 'My God, I did all that?!' Over time, day by day, it becomes a habit, part of your routine. It becomes part of you and you feel good because you see the improvement, how you are getting stronger, more comfortable, and you can tolerate more and more. On top of it all, you just become more proud and self-aware that, 'Hey, I am doing what I can with what we have,' and you are getting better.' Chara, his No. 33 one day to be hoisted to the Garden rafters, joins a legendary group of Bruins defensemen, including Eddie Shore, Bobby Orr, Ray Bourque, and Brad Park, to be named to the Hall of Fame. He is the 58th member of the Bruins, be it as player or builder, to be named to the Hall. The train kept rolling, Zdeno Chara remained aboard, moving forward in the cars, and on Tuesday the journey of some 35 years and 4,200 miles came to an end at the Hockey Hall of Fame station in Toronto. Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at
