On the trade market …
- Joe Smith of the Tampa Bay Times: Speculation is that the Lightning are shopping defenseman Matt Carle and his $5.5 million cap hit through 2017-18.
Wild GM Chuck Fletcher said that 15 teams have players on LTIR or are within $1 million of the salary cap ceiling, so there are not many teams that can take on salary at this time.
“It’s hard to make trades at the best of times because you’re trying to find a team that has what you need and they need to need what you have,” Fletcher said. “That’s hard enough, never mind balancing out the dollars. But now it has to be a dollar-for-dollar trade as well.
“Some of the teams that are well below the cap are budget teams and are probably at their number even if they’re not at the cap. So as the season goes on and more of the salaries and dollars get paid, it gets a little bit easier. But you have to be very creative this time of year.”
On the Sharks …
- Kevin Kurz of CSN Bay Area: (A Q&A with Patrick Marleau on trade rumors) … Marleau on trade rumors.
“I just go out and play. I can’t control what people are saying, or anything like that. Just focus on what I can control.”
The Sharks haven’t asked him to waive anything. Asked if there would be a situation in which he would agree to waive it.
“I don’t speculate or anything like that.”
Elliotte Friedman during Hockey Night in Canada.
“One of the names we’re hearing out there is Patrick Marleau. He’s got a no movement clause. There’s zero evidence the Sharks have asked him to waive it so I can’t say who is pushing for it, but his name is definitely out there.”
On the Bruins …
- CBS Boston: Cam Neely looking back at the Tyler Seguin trade … on if it was made solely based on on-ice concerns.
“No,” Neely said. “Not at all.”
“I think looking back, we probably could have done some things differently with Tyler. You’ve got a young kid coming in, maybe we could have handled his living arrangements a little different and stuff like that, that we’ve talked about over the years. It’s something we certainly are addressing currently, and in the future we will continue to address.”