What can the Sharks get for Brent Burns if they're retaining around $2m? I don't see them giving him up for nothing, and I also don't see them moving him if they don't think they can attract a 50+ point scoring forward in free agency. I know he has a partial NTC, but there is probably a team not on his list San Jose could make some kind of deal with.
The Sharks need right wingers, and scoring. Someone like Rickard Rackell, Andre Burakovsky, or similar might be a good place to look. If they're able to move Burns, there is plenty of cap to spare to sign someone in the medium term, as long as you leave a little bit to give Timo Meier a raise in the next offseason.
The Sharks have tons of guys that can play 3rd/4th line minutes, but don't have enough spots for all of them. Trading one or two of them away for a couple of picks is really the only way to get value out of everyone. Let Jonathan Dahlen, Noah Gregor, Rudolfs Balcers, Sasha Chemelevski, and Scott Reedy compete for their spots in the bottom 6, or move one of them up if Eklund/Bordeleau would be better off playing in the AHL for a while.
They also have 3 goalies, and someone needs to be the odd man out. Reimer is old, but seems to be a good as a 1A/1B with Kahkonen. Hill hasn't looked as promising, so lets try and get a pick for him as well.
Radim Simek is certainly an overpaid defenseman, but if Burns gets moved you won't be up against the cap ceiling, so no need to give up assets to move him. Let him sit in the press box for a year, he can come in when someone gets hurt. If you want, you could probably bury him in the AHL as well.
It really is incredible how many options appear once you clear 6-8m off of your books. You get to avoid buying out Vlasic for another year, take an extra year out of the EK65 deal, and get closer to recovering the dead cap from the Jones buyout. If the team avoids injuries and the young guys continue to develop, I could see them sneaking into a wild card spot, and just getting into the playoffs would be probably be considered a success from the teams perspective.
If the Sharks are actually serious about shopping Burns, I guarantee someone will take him for more value and less retention than everyone on this website thinks.
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