Morning Skate: Moves

Welcome to a new week, folks!

Here’s to hoping that your week gets off to a good start today.

The NHL week got off to quite a start yesterday, with the Pittsburgh Penguins, San Jose Sharks, and Montreal Canadiens putting their heads together to finally pull the trigger on the long-rumored Erik Karlsson trade.

The Sharks ended up sending the defenseman to Pittsburgh, acquiring Mikael Granlund, Mike Hoffman, Jan Rutta, and a first-round pick (top-10 protected).

Montreal was involved to help facilitate by throwing in (and receiving) a few other picks and prospects, but the big parts of the deal are above.

It’s quite a swing from Pittsburgh, who absorbed most of Karlsson’s cap hit they’ll take $10 million, with San Jose eating $1.5 million), which is on the books for four more seasons.

As some of you already noted in the other thread, the Penguins are running out of time to get the most out of their Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin/Kris Letting core, so you might as well just go for it.

The Sharks were holding out for a ransom of sorts for Karlsson. I’m not sure that’s what they ended up with, but they probably did as well as they could given Karlsson’s hard-to-maneuver AAV.

So...Pittsburgh adds another big piece.

The Eastern Conference should be fun next season!

What’s on tap for today?