Brent Ashton played for nine teams during a 14-year career, and was traded an extraordinary nine times: Vancouver to Winnipeg to Colorado to New Jersey to Minnesota to Quebec Detroit to Winnipeg to Boston to Calgary. Along the way he had seven 20-goal seasons, but missed the hallowed 1,000-game mark by exactly two games.
Ashton was drafted by Vancouver back in 1979, 26th overall, after a junior career that culminated with 64 goals and 119 points with Saskatoon. Over the course of his nine teams, he played the fewest games with Calgary (32) and the most with Winnipeg (221). Those nine trades involved some 16 players, yet despite going from town to town he scored more than 20 goals seven times and had a career-high 31 with the Jets in 1988-89, the same year he won a silver medal playing for Canada at the World Championships.
Ashton was not a rough player and he was generally on teams that finished out of the playoffs, though he did go as far as the semi-finals with Detroit in 1987 and 1988. His career ended at age 33 after he suffered a knee injury while with the Las Vegas Thunder of the IHL, his NHL career over after 998 games.
