Acquisition of Nazarov From Flames Is Big Deal

The Mighty Ducks got a little bigger and a lot meaner Tuesday, acquiring right wing Andrei Nazarov from Calgary for defenseman prospect Jordan Leopold.

Nazarov, 6 feet 5 and 234 pounds, was a first-round pick (10th overall) by the San Jose Sharks in 1992. His NHL career has been checkered with ejections and suspensions.

“We wanted to be bigger up front,” Duck General Manager Pierre Gauthier said. “He’s had some ups and downs in his career, but we got him at the right age.”

The downs have been well documented.

Nazarov, 26, was suspended seven games and fined $1,000 for cross-checking Colorado’s Cam Russell during the 1998-99 season. He was suspended six games for shoving a linesman in 1996-97. He was suspended four games and fined $500 for head-butting a player in 1995.

During a 1998 exhibition game he sucker-punched Florida’s Rob Niedermayer, and in a 1997 game against the Kings he started a benches-clearing brawl, after which eight players were ejected.

Of course, those things made Nazarov more appealing to the Ducks.

Asked about Nazarov’s volatile nature, Gauthier said that it is “not necessarily a bad thing.”

Nazarov, who had 10 goals and a career-high 32 points last season, will make $925,000 this season.

Leopold, who plays for the University of Minnesota, was a second-round pick in 1999. A wealth of young defensemen made him expendable to the Ducks, who also received a second-round pick in the 2001 draft.

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The Ducks beefed up during the off-season by signing free-agent center German Titov, and they also drafted Jonas Ronnqvist, a 27-year-old right wing from Sweden.

Titov is 6 feet 1, 201 pounds, Ronnqvist is 6-1, 200 and they’ve added the bulky Nazarov.

“You’re going to see some highlight goals, but the majority of the goals scored in this league are scored by people hanging around the net,” Duck Coach Craig Hartsburg said.

The Ducks know what they have in Titov, and think they know in Nazarov’s case. But Ronnqvist is an unknown.

He had 15 goals and 39 points in 49 games with Lulea HF of the Swedish Elite League last year.

“We wanted to get some big guys with skills,” Gauthier said. “Look at the people we lost, Ted Donato [5-10, 180] and Kip Miller [5-10, 190]. They were good players, but small. We replaced them with big guys.”