sign Jacob Trouba<\/a> to a four-year, $8.25 million AAV contract.<\/p>\nMark Lazerus: Mike Grier, it turns out, is fallible.<\/p>\n
Through a combination of savvy moves and lottery luck, the Sharks general manager has been understandably lauded for speed-running the rebuilding process in San Jose. But signing Jacob Trouba to a four-year deal at an $8.25-million cap hit \u2014 even considering the rocketing rates for defensemen \u2014 is a head-scratcher, for sure.<\/p>\n
Did the Sharks need some veteran stability on the back end after spending so much draft capital and attention on the forward group? Absolutely. Is Trouba coming off his best season in years in Anaheim, even if it was buoyed by playing alongside Jackson LaCombe? Sure. Did the speed- and skill-oriented Sharks just get nastier and harder to play against, with Trouba joining Mason Marchment as new signings? They did.<\/p>\n
Is Trouba worth $8.25 million a year? He is absolutely not.<\/p>\n
Not counting your Cale Makars and Quinn Hugheses and Zach Werenskis, the best defensemen tend to go largely unnoticed. And for better or worse \u2014 often worse \u2014 Trouba is one of the most noticeable defensemen in the league. He\u2019s known for his booming, borderline hits, but his unquenchable thirst to dole out those hits often leaves him badly out of position. LaCombe masked a lot of his issues in Anaheim, to the point he was essentially a break-even player in terms of expected goals, a plateau he hadn\u2019t reached since his Winnipeg days. His big shot found the back of the net 10 times, too, after scoring four in the previous two seasons combined. But in San Jose, he\u2019s not going to have a partner anywhere near LaCombe\u2019s level. He\u2019s too slow to be a true top-pairing defenseman alongside Sam Dickinson, he\u2019s not responsible enough to be a shutdown defender alongside, say, Dmitry Orlov, and he\u2019s too pricey to make sense as a depth guy.<\/p>\n
Who are the top five NHL players to hit free agency?<\/p>\n
Signing Trouba in a vacuum isn\u2019t a bad idea. The Sharks could use some of what he brings, and a young team can benefit from having a player who was a captain in a major market in New York. But this isn\u2019t a vacuum, and while prices are high all over the place (other than Montreal, it seems), this was simply too high for too long.<\/p>\n
Contract grade: C-minus<\/p>\n
Shayna Goldman: See, I don\u2019t even think this one is a head-scratcher. Not even for a team that has gotten off to a fantastic start this offseason. It\u2019s the kind of trap contract general managers cannot help but sign.<\/p>\n
There are ways to defend it. The Sharks desperately need defensemen. Before the Trouba signing, the team only had three under contract for next year: Dmitry Orlov, Michael Kesselring, and Sam Dickinson. And not one of them is a true minute-eater who can be leaned on against top competition. So factor in Trouba\u2019s experience playing shutdown minutes, the veteran presence he brings to an up-and-coming locker room, and the fact that San Jose has cap flexibility over the next few years, and this all checks out, right?<\/p>\n
Well, not exactly \u2014 and certainly not at that price. Because even at his best, he can\u2019t live up to the $8.25 million price tag. Trouba\u2019s track record is way too much of a mixed bag.<\/p>\n
As much as he bounced back with the Ducks last season, that rebound has its limits. At his best, he\u2019s a No.4 who can put up passable results in his minutes, with a right-shot and some sandpaper. At his worst, his footspeed burns him at defending the rush, he botches his retrievals and gets hemmed in his own zone, and just gets peppered in scoring chances against. Even if he lands somewhere in between, it won\u2019t be $8.25 million caliber, not even in this cap environment. Trouba only projects to be worth $3.1 million, on average, over the next four years. Age-related declines could sink that even further, and that\u2019s pretty believable for someone with his physical play style.<\/p>\n
While the Sharks obviously didn\u2019t have a ton of options to choose from in free agency this year, this team has all the trade assets to swing a trade that 1) has more upside and, 2) lines up better with their timeline.<\/p>\n
The four-year term is the saving grace, because he shouldn\u2019t totally block the Sharks\u2019 younger talent from jumping into a meaningful role. Still, it doesn\u2019t absolve Grier from this signing. It\u2019s a major misstep before San Jose\u2019s window is even officially open.<\/p>\n
Contract grade: D<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The contract San Jose Sharks sign Jacob Trouba to a four-year, $8.25 million AAV contract. Mark Lazerus: Mike…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40832,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[404,88,90,89,98],"class_list":["post-382511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-nhl","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-san-jose-sharks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}