Rumor: One of the NHL's truly elite defenseman may soon be on a new team.

A huge and shocking rumor from one of the NHL's top insiders.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 7 years ago
Rumor: One of the NHL's truly elite defenseman may soon be on a new team.

We heard some huge comments from one of hockey's top insiders today.

In a recent radio interview TSN insider Bob McKenzie discussed the future of the San Jose Sharks, and more specifically the future of the members on their current roster, and those comments included some truly stunning details regarding Brent Burns, one of the NHL's premiere defensemen.

McKenzie began by stating his belief that Burns wants to stay in San Jose.

“Burns is the most interesting one of the bunch because he’s obviously a huge presence on the San Jose blueline, and one of the better defensemen in the National Hockey League," said McKenzie as per Nichols on Hockey.  "An impact guy. I think in many ways he wants to be back in San Jose. If Joe’s signed up, nd they’ve got their core with Couture, Pavelski, and Hertl and some of those guys – Vlasic – there’s an excellent chance he could be back. It’s just a matter of him and his agent having to figure out how they’re going to make the contract work so that the team – that core – can stay together."

While those initial comments make it sounds like Burns will remain where he is, he followed those up by indicating that Burns had an opportunity to get a deal done this summer, and added that not only did the deal not get done, but it doesn't sounds like the two sides were even close.

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“But the flip side of that is he easily could have signed, like Brad Marchand, this summer – an extension with San Jose – and he didn’t. And they never really got appreciable talks going in terms of crunching numbers back and forth and trading proposals. So what that tells me is that he’s at least keeping a little bit of an open mind here to see how the season goes before he makes any commitments. So I can’t sit here and tell you, by any stretch, that he won’t be back with San Jose next year. But I would also caution and say that we shouldn’t assume that it’s an absolute slam-dunk that he will be back with San Jose.”

You can bet the Sharks are aware of this as well, and while we doubt the Sharks would even consider moving him unless they were well out of the playoffs prior to the trade deadline, they may be forced to at least consider their options given that Burns only has a limited no trade-clause.

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