For Wilson, Tavares Isles candy
New York center could become coveted free agent
If it was possible to plant a computer chip in Sharks general manager Doug Wilson’s brain to read his thoughts, Saturday would be the perfect day to do so.
The New York Islanders will be in town for a showdown, which means Wilson’s eyes will be glued on John Tavares, a pending unrestricted free agent who could be the biggest name to hit the open market in at least a decade.
When Wilson watches Tavares blaze down the ice, post up and create scoring chances, will he simply be appreciating the talent of one of the game’s top two-way centers, or will he see him as the solution to the biggest puzzle he has faced in his 14-year tenure as the Sharks’ top decision maker?
As Joe Thornton enters his twilight years in the wake of Patrick Marleau’s departure to Toronto, Wilson is attempting to pull off what only one team has been able to accomplish in the salary cap era. He’s trying to give his squad a heart transplant while maintaining its status as a perennial Stanley Cup contender in the Western Conference.
Through tremendous scouting and drafting, the Detroit Red Wings managed to transition away from its core of Steve Yzerman and Brendan Shanahan to a group led by Pavel Datsyuk, Henrik Zetterberg and Niklas Lidstrom last decade without missing the playoffs. Most teams take a nose dive into irrelevancy once their core players reach their expiration dates.
But if the Sharks are going to be a force in the Pacific Division for the rest of the decade and beyond, Wilson will need to find a way to acquire another Olympic-caliber player to complement his revamped core of Brent Burns, Logan Couture and Marc-Edouard Vlasic.
And netting a big fish is a lot trickier in the NHL than say, Major League Baseball, in which wellheeled teams can throw wads of cash at the best free agents.
In hockey, the top players seldom hit the open market. Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, Steven Stamkos and Anze Kopitar all signed maximum contract extensions instead of entering unrestricted free agency (Burns did the same with the Sharks last fall).
Blockbuster trades are getting harder and harder to pull off in the salary cap era, too. Every team is dealing with tight-financial restrictions, so it’s challenging to find a dance partner with cap space and needs that line up in perfect synchronicity.
The Nashville Predators managed to pull off two such trades over the last couple of seasons, but they also had blue-line depth, a rarity in the modern NHL, so they had the ability to dangle the pieces that everyone so desperately needs.
But Tavares could be the exception this summer or at the trade deadline because of the continued uncertainly hovering over the Islanders’ arena situation, giving the Sharks a unique opportunity to acquire an elite player in his prime years.
Although Tavares, 27, is said to be content with the franchise that selected him with the first pick in the 2009 NHL draft, he knows that it will be hard to attract a high-quality supporting cast until the team locks down a permanent home.
The Islanders will be leaving the Barclays Center in Brooklyn after the 2018-19 season, and at this point, it’s unclear whether they will return to Long Island (a scenario that commissioner Gary Bettman is opposed to) or attempt to build an arena in Belmont Park or next to Citi Field, the home of the New York Mets.
In short, Tavares isn’t going to commit to the team on a longterm basis until this situation is cleared up, which isn’t likely to happen overnight.
As a result, Tavares should be an appetizing option for the looming postThornton era of Sharks hockey.
He has scored 0.91 points per game during his eight seasons, reached the 30goal mark in three of the last four seasons in which he has played more than 70 games and he plays a hard two-way style that meshes with coach Pete DeBoer’s defense-first approach.
Acquiring Tavares would also give the Sharks a shot of replicating the Thornton-Couture dynamic down the middle that has given opposing coaches matchup nightmares over the last seven years.
But cap science is tricky in the NHL and the potential cost of signing Tavares to a longterm deal should give Wilson reason to book a few sessions with a therapist.
The Sharks should have about $17.5 million in cap space next summer when Thornton’s $8 million, Joel Ward’s $3.275 million and Jannik Hansen’s $2 million come off the books, giving the team plenty of cash to throw around. But Tavares will likely command about $80 million over eight years, so the Sharks would really be locking themselves in by bringing him aboard.
The team already owes Burns $8 million a year through the 2024-25 season, Vlasic $7 million a year through 2025-26, and Couture will deserve $8 million-plus when he hits the market after the 201819 campaign. If Wilson were to throw Tavares on the books, too, he would basically be relegating the Sharks to Chicago Blackhawks status where most of his budget is tied up in a few players, requiring him to fill out his depth with unknown commodities on a near-annual basis.
It’s also unclear whether Tavares will continue to be a dominant player into his 30s. The NHL continues to get younger and faster every year and speed has never been Tavares’ game. His production has dipped in each of his last three seasons, too, raising serious questions about whether he will be worth anywhere near $10 million three or four years down the road.
A better option for the Sharks would be trading for Colorado center Matt Duchene, whose speed and skill mesh perfectly with of modern game.