Lightning To Show Interest In Sharks' Winger At Trade Deadline

The Tampa Bay Lightning are always a Stanley Cup contender no matter where they finish in the top-8. They also always find a way to make some big and interesting moves at the trade deadline to get better. Over the past few seasons, this has included Blake Coleman, Barclay Goodrow, Brandon Hagel, and Tanner Jeannot. This season, even with very limited cap space, I wouldn't count them out from making another move that helps them once again.

The Lightning won't be able to add anyone big, so anyone making around $4 million-plus should probably be excluded from this conversation. The team should be able to squeeze in anyone under that with a little working around to make the cap work.

The target that the Lightning should have their eyes on this season may be Anthony Duclair from the San Jose Sharks. It would be foolish for the Sharks to hold onto the pending UFA and he has a very attractive cap hit of $3 million AAV. San Jose has lots of cap space in order to retain money on Duclair, especially just $1.5 million. That would make a huge difference for the Lightning and keep them in the race to potentially show interest in and acquire the Sharks' winger.

Although he may be having a tough season on the abysmal Sharks with just eight goals and 16 points in 42 games, he has more than proved that he can produce offensively on a team that isn't at the very bottom of the league and he is very fast. The Lightning could use a little bit more of that and Duclair would be able to play up and down the lineup effectively.