Why would the Sharks do that trade?

Clear cap for Tavares

Why not just not resign Thornton for 4 mill? Cap ceiling is also going up. But the answer is sell of one of the top tier D men in the league (that they signed to an extension) for a 4th, a 2nd pairing Dman and a prospect that, while promising, hasn't shown where he's going to fall on an NHL roster yet

GMBots says welcome to Buffalo Mr. Vlasic & Mr. Boedker.... order your wings hot and soupy with extra blue cheese.... no ranch boys that is only for lettuce!

Vlasic just signed a long term contract and he's considered the core of the team, he isn't going anywhere and certainly not Buffalo. You can have Boedker though. Tavares wont sign for more than $10M per season. He's good but if you make a comparison of his stats to McDavid, $10M is about right. Also, gonna have to pay more for Evander Kane's services most likely. Hertl just isn't a $6M per year player. He hasn't surpassed 50 pts in any season. Also, you are going to have to pay Tierney much more than that on a bridge deal, think Hertl's expiring contract. If the Sharks sign Tavares, they likely wont resign Jumbo.

Try again please.

Agree with you on everything except how much Tavares signs for. He will get over $11 million, I agree with you that he shouldn’t but desperate teams will offer him ridiculous contracts. Cough cough MTL

Well I cant agree with you there. Tavares certainly wont get more than 10M per season in cap hit. He'll might get $13M real money for a couple years at the most. see my table below. Tavares is a really really good player, but he is not at the McDavid, or even Stamkos level at even strength. Some GM's may be dumb, but they aren't that dumb. Tavares also is going to go to a team where he's going to do a lot of winning.

P/60 Rank - Name - P/60 - Total Points - Contract AAV
3 - McDavid - 3.2 - 108 - 12.5M
6 - McKinnon - 3 - 97 - 6.3M
7- Matthews - 2.93 - 63 - ELC
8- Barzal - 2.89 - 85 - ELC
11 - Kucherov - 2.85 - 100 - 4.8M
12 - Marchand - 2.83 - 85 - 6.1M
14 - Giroux - 2.73 - 102 - 8.3M
17 - Stamkos - 2.6 - 86 - 8.5M
85 - Tavares - 2.03 - 84 - ???

Good discussion though. I appreciate the respectful discourse.

I see your reasoning but free agency in the summer seems to dumb down the mind of GMs (Matt Belesky is probably the biggest example of that). But wait and see if he truly wants to win or just wants to take the money and run.

Vlasic is 30 years old, and is on a 7m X 8 years contract. No way the Sabres (or any team) trades for him. They can spend the money in UFA (maybe not this year) and keep there young assets. I'm sure Vlasic NMC nixes any deal to a bottom feeder.

Sharks would never do that trade.