Joining the Chicago Blackhawks in the land of salary cap reductions, San Jose will have a slightly smaller amount of dollars to use next season due to bonus overage:

Sources tell capgeek.com nine teams will face a cap reduction this coming season because performance bonuses earned pushed them past the upper limit in 2009-2010. The Blackhawks lead the way by a long shot at an estimated $4.15 million, but the Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs are getting hit hard too.

Other notable penalties include the Edmonton Oilers, at $354,000, and the San Jose Sharks, at $327,500.

>> Cap Geek

A penalty of $327,500 isn't crippling by any means, but does give Sharks General Manager Doug Wilson a little less to play with when trying to land a top tier defenseman via the trade or free agent market. It will be interesting to see if this has any consequences on the acquisition of players, but due to the relatively small size of the reduction, I doubt it influences things all too much.

For all armchair GM's out there, Capgeek has updated their cap calculator to reflect the situation.The Sharks now have $6.637MM available to use, with three forwards needing to be signed. That short list includes restricted free agent Devin Setoguchi.

I'll be back later tonight with some potential trade targets San Jose could pursue.

Go Sharks.