The San Jose Sharks made an interesting trade today, potentially clearing the way for a larger deal in the near future. The team moved two defensemen, Jake Furlong and Ryan Ellis, along with a 2028 fourth-round pick to the Chicago Blackhawks for goaltender Laurent Brossoit, defenseman Nolan Allan and a 2028 seventh-round pick. (Small brag because I suggested a Furlong trade last week.) The picks are so far in the future, they’re inconsequential at this point for either team, so we’ll focus on the players.
What does this deal do for the Blackhawks?
The only way this seems to make sense for the Blackhawks is that the team is trying to get some salary back. After a hot start to the season, Chicago has cooled off considerably. The Central Division is a tough, tough place to play. Chicago is in fifth place in the Central, 15 points behind the third place Minnesota Wild. It’s also in fifth place in the Western Conference wild card race, though it’s only three points back of the Los Angeles Kings with one more game played. Chicago isn’t out of the race, but it’s also not in the best position to make the playoffs. As Sharks fans know, there are a lot of teams clustered around those two wild card spots, and unlike the Sharks, Chicago doesn’t have the luxury of jumping up into the division; it’s wild card or nothing.
So it seems Chicago might be positioning itself to sell, and if that’s the case, it needs to stay above the cap floor. Taking on a salary like Ryan Ellis’ $6.25 million certainly helps in that regard. Chicago is only about $12 million above the cap floor after acquiring Ellis’ contract. The team will need his contract this season and next season, especially if it plans to be sellers at the trade deadline.
As for Furlong, it feels like this is just swapping out one AHL defenseman for another. Chicago gets one that’s younger and with slightly more term in Furlong. Furlong has one more season remaining on his $841,666 contract. He’s played 12 games with the San Jose Barracuda this season and has two assists.
What do the Sharks get in Nolan Allan?
As for Nolan Allan, the Sharks get a slightly more veteran defenseman to help the San Barracuda. Allan has six points in 29 games with the Rockford IceHogs in the AHL this season. He’s a 6-foot-2, 195-pound defenseman who has appeared in 43 career NHL games and has 8 NHL points (1 G, 7 A).
Looking at Allan’s regularized-adjusted plus-minus (RAPM) chart from Evolving Hockey for the 2024-25 season, you can see that he wasn’t particularly impactful for the Blackhawks.
Of course, no one on the Blackhawks was; the team finished 31st in the league, just above the Sharks.
Allan had different types of defensive partners during that season. He mostly played with TJ Brodie and Connor Murphy, but he also spent time with Seth Jones and Alec Martinez. The trouble is, whether he was paired with the offensively minded Jones or the defensively minded Martinez, he was still a negative in expected goals per 60 minutes. In fact, when paired with the more offensively minded Jones, the pairing was a minus-3.19 goals per 60 minutes.
That said, Allan has played for Team Canada in some tournaments. He represented Canada at the most recent Spengler Cup (the same tournament Eric Pohlkamp played in for Team USA), and he played for Team Canada at the 2023 World Junior Championship, where he won a gold medal. He has potential.
At just 22, he’s likely hit the peak of his scoring powers, but he might be able to develop into a defensively sound asset for the Sharks. If not, he’s in the final season of his contract, which gives the Sharks some contract flexibility, something the team did not have previously with Furlong.
What do the Sharks get with Brossoit?
Brossoit is perhaps the most perplexing and maybe intriguing piece of this entire deal because he’s an actual NHL player, and he has the potential to yield actual returns at the trade deadline. But as far as we know, the Sharks aren’t in the market for a goaltender, are they?
Brossoit is in the final season of a contract he signed in July 2024, which pays him $3.3 million per year. The thing is, he’s a risk because he’s never played for any of that contract. Brossoit had knee surgery in August 2024 and then had another knee surgery in December of the same year. He had hip surgery after that. Since then, he’s been working on recovering.
He’s now healthy and ready to see if he can get back on the ice. The 32-year-old is expected to report to the San Jose Barracuda to get some conditioning reps in. After that, it’s anyone’s guess. Two years is a long time to be away from the game.
What this does do is give the Sharks options. Before Brossoit went down with an injury, the netminder was a solid backup for Connor Hellebuyck in Winnipeg. In 2023-24, Brossoit had a 15-5-2 record with a 2.00 goals against average and .927 save percentage. He’s played 140 games in his career and has a 64-46-13 record and a .911 save percentage.
Brossoit has never set himself up as a starter, but he’s certainly a very good backup.
Conclusion
It’s a tidy piece of business for General Manager Mike Grier, who frees up a bit of cap space for a potential move at the trade deadline and adds a piece that could be moved closer to said deadline in Brossoit. Even if Brossoit isn’t moved, Grier may have added some insurance for the Sharks in the net if rookie goaltender Yaroslav Askarov stumbles or the Barracuda need some more veteran help.
It also adds some contract flexibility. Allan and Brossoit are both on expiring contracts, which means two contracts can come off the books in July if the Sharks decide to go that route. With Ellis and Furlong, the Sharks would have had to wait another year, until 2027, for both of those contracts to expire.
