In a surprising move, the Minnesota Wild have traded defenseman Calen Addison to the San Jose Sharks in exchange for a sixth-round pick in 2026 and minor leaguer Adam Raska.

Addison has zero goals and five assists in 12 games for the Wild this season, had seen his ice time decline over his recent outings, and had even lost his top power play role. Let's break down what this means.

What San Jose Gets

It wasn't long ago that Addison was thought to be one of the up-and-coming puck movers that would be a staple of Minnesota's blue line into the 2030s. He hadn't taken the step the team wanted him to, however, and with Jared Spurgeon likely returning from injury soon, he was shipped to California.

A big part of Addison's issue was that he hasn't shown a lot in transition yet. Tracking from AllThreeZones has him well below average in areas like successful zone exit percentage and controlled zone entries. Combine that with defensive metrics that got progressively worse as his career moved along, add a dash of horrific on-ice goals against results, and the result is being traded. Coaches will put up with middling (or poor) defensive play if there is exceptional offensive play, and it'd be hard to argue Addison approached anything called exceptional offensive play.

Though he's not a tremendous power play option, he is a massive improvement on anything that San Jose has on their roster. He will likely get more minutes than the 16-17 he typically earns, but on a team that is awful already, the net-benefit is likely to be negligible. It also precludes Addison from ever regaining a top PP role on a team that has seen some good PP success over the last few years.

This is a case where more minutes may not mean a lot for Addison, fantasy-wise. He may have only five points, but every San Jose defenceman has combined for nine points, so how much (if at all) Addison's production rates improve will be low. For a player that doesn't have good per-minute peripheral rates, either, this is a fantasy option only for very deep leagues, or very desperate players.

Minnesota opens a spot on the blueline for Spurgeon's return, and Addison had already been booted off the power play, so the only real change for the Wild might come from the goaltending. The now-traded defender had by far the highest goals-against rate on Minnesota's blueline, so maybe this makes life easier for Filip Gustavsson and Marc-Andre Fleury.

Who This Helps

Minnesota Goaltending

Jared Spurgeon

Who This Hurts

Kyle Burroughs

Jacob MacDonald

Calen Addison