It's another year of a rebuild in the Bay Area. As we close in on the super bowl as we all want to see the San Francisco 49ers overcome the Kansas City Chiefs and bring a championship back to the bay. It's going to be a good week in the area if the Niners are able to overcome the Mahomes and Taylor Swift's boyfriend. Moving back to hockey, it's also going to be an interesting time for the San Jose Sharks moving forward.
With Mike Grier declaring some time ago that the San Jose Sharks were open for business, a lot of people would have expected to see some movement by now. With Elias Lindholm moving from Calgary to Vancouver and Sean Monahan heading to Winnipeg from Montreal, the center market is well and truly open, but there aren't a lot of centers on this roster that the rest of the league are going to be looking at ahead od the trade deadline.
On the wings, the one holding up everything is probably Ottawa with the future of Vladimir Tarasenko. As probably the best option available, he's going to draw interest. When he comes off the market, teams are going to go to their fall-back options, whether that be Anthony Duclair, or someone else from different teams that want to sell, it'll be an interesting situation between now and the end of the trade window.
On the blueline, Calgary is the culprit holding everyone up. With two pending unrestricted free-agent defensemen, Noah Hanifin and Chris Tanev, chalking the defensive market up, the rest of the NHL is waiting to see what unfolds with those two. The second these two come off the trade boards, we're going to see a lot of action among defenseman, and it could see players from the Sharks get moved if the front office feels so inclined to do so.
For the goalie market, the hold up is going to be price. There's not a specific team trying to get a kings ransom for their netminders, it's more that the teams that might be interested are still unsure whether or not they want to add to what they have instead of just riding it out. That could take up until the trade deadline for some teams, and it's a case where the supply exceeds the demand in net, so not everyone will move.
We know the Sharks are still going to move forward, hoping to move on from several players on their roster. We will see what happens over the coming weeks, but the deadline coming closer is going to force teams around the NHL to decide on whether or not they are going to make a move at this deadline. San Jose will need a partner to move the players they want, and it could be a while before they find one.