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Why Wild traded for Blake Coleman in deal that sends Jake Middleton to Flames
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- Why Wild traded for Blake Coleman in deal that sends Jake Middleton to Flames
Why Wild traded for Blake Coleman in deal that sends Jake Middleton to Flames originally appeared on The Sporting News . Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here .
Blake Coleman had been on the trade block for a while.
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Finally, he's on the move. On Thursday, the Calgary Flames traded the veteran center to the Minnesota Wild .
The deal was reported by Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman , who adds that Olli Maatta is also going to Minnesota while Jake Middleton and picks go to Calgary.
ESPN's Emily Kaplan adds that the Flames are retaining half of Coleman's salary.
It's not totally unexpected, given that Coleman had been on the block, but the Wild weren't necessarily everyone's expected destination.
MORE: The Maple Leafs have pulled off the Sergei Bobrovsky signing
Why did Wild-Flames do Blake Coleman trade?
Coleman is still a quality center even at 34 years old.
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For a poor Calgary team in 2025-26, he had 20 goals and 15 assists in 69 games.
He has played 693 games and had 170 goals and 155 assists in his NHL career.
Simply put, he brings veteran presence, winning pedigree (two Stanley Cups) and solid leadership to a team that wants to keep pushing for a Cup.
Middleton is a nice return for Calgary, a 30-year old defenseman with 381 games of NHL experience.
Only the draft pick portion of this deal has youth -- Maatta going to the Wild is 31 years old -- so it's really a reallocation of resources, with a bit of future assets going to Calgary while they continue a rebuild.
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