The San Jose Sharks are a team to watch in the days to come.
There is a distinct possibility that the Sharks will execute a blockbuster trade in the days to come. According to CSN Bay Area, Sharks GM Doug Wilson is feeling like a change might do his roster a lot of good. Wilson hired former New Jersey and Florida head coach Peter DeBoer last month. Former incumbent head coach Todd McLellan and Wilson parted "mutually" in April. McLellan went on to coach Team Canada to the gold medal at the IIHF World Championships. He is now the head coach of Connor McDavid's Edmonton Oilers.,
By my estimation, there are three prime candidates and one dark horse player to be traded out of San Jose in the days to come.
One concludes that former team captain turned GM sniper Joe Thornton wants to pack his hockey bag and skate out of NoCal. He and GM Doug Wilson waged their war of words in public last season. Why would Thornton want to stay and play in the city by the bay?
Veteran winger Patrick Marleau’s name always gets mentioned in trade rumors at this time of year. Like Thornton, Marleau is a point producing machine who has never succeeded at leading his team to hoisting Lord Stanley’s Cup. Thornton and Marleau are always the groomsmen and never the groom.
There is no doubt in my mind that a change could do both players a lot of good. I see them adding immediate scoring and leadership to playoff teams on the cusp of winning like Dallas, Winnipeg, Washington, Ottawa, or St. Louis. They might add immediate value to young teams with salary cap space like Florida, Calgary and Edmonton.
I don’t see a fit for Thornton nor Marleau on the Buffalo Sabres. Not this season anyway. The Sabres have no need for 35 year old ballers right now. Thornton has two years remaining on his current contract at $6.75 million per season. Marleau has two seasons remaining at $6.66 million per season. Murray could afford to add either player’s huge cap hit, however, he’ll pass on the duo because of his commitment to play an aggressive, in your face, fast, hard game. NHL senior citizens need not apply to Buffalo. Brian Gionta is the lone greybeard on the young Sabres. Gionta will continue to groom Zemgus Girgensons, Evander Kane, Tyler Ennis, Zach Bogosian, and Rasmus Ristolainen, who will assume the leadership mantle of the Sabres in the near future. Tim Murray is hyper-focused on building his team in the same vein that Dean Lombardi built his two-time Stanley Cup winning LA Kings. Murray is shrewdly drafting and trading for the best young players that meet his prerequisite characteristics of being young, fast, skilled and hard to play against. Thornton and Marleau would no doubt act as coaches on the ice for super talented youngsters Jack Eichel, Samson Reinhart, Zemgus Girgensons, Tyler Ennis, Marcus Foligno and others. However, adding big guns like Jumbo Joe and Marleau would only stunt the growth of the kids in Buffalo by eating up their ice time and special teams opportunities. Brent Burns played his ass off for Team Canada’s gold medal winning team at the IIHF World Championships in Prague in May. NHL GMs may have an appetite to add the burly top four mountain moving Burns. Murray may want to take a poke at Burns, who at 30 years of age, is older than Murray’s core target age. Burns has two years remaining on his current deal at $5.76 million per season.
The one player that I see as a dark horse candidate to land in Buffalo is center/winger Logan Couture.
Tim Murray knows the book, chapter and verse on Couture. Murray watched the former Ottawa 67’s scoring star light up the OHL when he was the assistant GM with the Ottawa Senators. Couture, who just turned 26 in March, was the 9th overall pick of the Sharks at the 2007 NHL Draft. Couture (6'1" and 200 lbs.) will earned $6 million for the next four seasons. His contract is a true value because Wilson locked him up long term contract just before the player hit his prime years. Couture had his best statistical season in 2014-15 when he popped 27 goals and added 40 assists for 67 points in 82 games played. He scored 32 and 31 goals respectively in 2010-11 and 2011-12.
In 379 career NHL games, all with the Sharks, Couture has scored 139 goals and has assisted on 148 others. His 287 career regular season points suggest to me that he is just getting started in terms of maximizing his true offensive production potential.
The kid comes to play in the postseason as well. He has scored 18 goals and added 18 assists in 56 career playoff games while with the Sharks.
There’s no reason to doubt whether Couture can someday score 35-40 goals per season. He thrives 5 on 5 and with an increased PP role, could easily pot 8-10 PPGs per season.
At the end of the dismal 2014-15 regular season that saw the Sharks miss the playoffs for the first time in his six year career in San Jose, Couture was critical of his organization’s “not great… culture.
Perhaps Couture, a lifelong Buffalo Bills fan, would like to move home and play a leadership role for a future powerhouse team in the Buffalo Sabres. Couture hails from nearby Guelph, Ontario.
The Sharks have flexibility in terms of their cap and they are open to all options. Wilson has $16 million in available cap space to work with. However, the UFA market is very weak this summer.
Wilson may offer sheet Tyler Toffoli, Brandon Saad, or Vlad Tarasenko or two for a top restricted free agent. "We're putting this team in a position to bounce back and be very competitive come September,… Wilson said. “Will we explore everything? Yeah, we will.…
Wilson has come under fire by the fans and media for the recent demise of the once dominant Sharks. San Jose ownership has tasked Wilson with turning things around in real time. Not an easy task when you have aging stars who are making fat money on long term deals.
Wilson is willing to swing for the fences if it means he can fix his messy team sooner than later. Missing the postseason for the first time in ten seasons has left Wilson no choice other than to get his team back in the playoffs this season. He knows that he will have to give up an asset or two in order to get assets in return.
“You have to give to get, no matter what. Even unrestricted free agency you are giving something: cap space. There are other teams that are in position where they have to make decisions because cap space is of value. First round picks and second round picks have value. You’re going to have to give up something. Are we willing to do that? Sure we are.…
Wilson must covet Murray’s early round draft choices #21 and #31 picks. He can also ask Murray for young centers Mikhail Grigorenko, Cody Hodgson, Tyler Ennis and D prospects Nikita Zadorov and Chad Ruhwedel. I'm not saying that Ennis is available for trade. The Sabres love his production and his tenacity on the puck. However, Wilson may want to take back a top six center if he trades Couture away. It's a high risk-high reward move to be sure.
He is ready to listen to any and all offers for the ninth overall pick in the 2015 NHL Draft, especially once the draft gets underway on Friday.
Tim Murray has $29 million in available cap space and he is open for business. Murray has to spend $11 million to get to the NHL salary cap floor which is projected to be $71 million in 2015-16. The NHL will be announcing the exact salary cap figure in the next couple of days at as the GMs are meeting in Las Vegas for meetings in advance of Friday's NHL Draft in Sunrise, Florida.
The Sharks have gone eight straight years without selecting a player in the top 10, but they are scheduled to pick ninth this year after finishing 22nd in the overall standings in 2014-15. Wilson has been stockpiling draft picks during the past two seasons and is open to making trades on the draft floor.
"When you get to that point and sit on the draft floor, sometimes things get offered out of left field," Wilson said. "Sometimes people move up a spot, move down a spot. Our history speaks to we've done all those things. You listen in this business.
"When opportunities come; that's how we got Brent Burns [in 2011]. The draft was in Minnesota. They didn't have a first-round pick. We have players that people like and people call and that's great. We have draft picks that people like and we have a lot of picks going forward that people like. You want the phones ringing and people calling you and offering things. That's the position we're in. Get on the draft floor and you never know."
The Sharks have eight picks, including two in the top 39.
"When we talked about going through this and positioning ourselves, its actions instead of words,… Wilson told the Sharks website.
Never under estimate the power and might of Tim Murray. In February, he shocked the NHL community when he traded Tyler Myers, Drew Stafford, Brenden Lemieux, Joel Armia and a 2015 first round pick to Winnipeg in exchange for Evander Kane and Zach Bogosian.
If Wilson wants to make a blockbuster deal, he should speak with Murray. Wilson should do so ASAP, if not sooner. If Murray can’t land Ryan O’Reilly from Colorado, trading for Logan Couture would be a great get. It would move the rebuilding Sabres a quantum leap forward in their quest to restore greatness to the Buffalo Sabres.
Sabres fans can day dream about a #1 line of Evander Kane-Jack Eichel-Logan Couture.
Thanks, Sharks TV