The San Jose Sharks have signed center Nathan Todd to a two-year, two-way contract. The deal carries a $775k cap hit in the NHL, a $225k yearly AHL salary, and $225k in yearly guarantees.
With Springfield Thunderbirds teammate Brady Lyle headed to the Washington Capitals, Todd is the second member of the Thunderbirds’ 2021-22 Calder Cup Finals squad to sign with another club today.
Todd is a 27-year-old center who has taken a bit of a winding road to this current point in his career, where he’s an established, valuable AHLer. Todd was a productive two-year OHLer before splitting his first full season away from junior hockey in the ECHL and Canadian University circuit. He then spent three seasons with the ECHL’s now-defunct Brampton Beast, going from middle-of-the-lineup player to point-per-game scorer.
Todd earned his first full-time AHL opportunity in 2020-21 with the Manitoba Moose, and he made the most of it scoring 12 goals and 32 points in 36 games in the AHL’s All-Canadian division. He even managed to be named to his division’s All-Star Team and parlayed that successful AHL campaign into his first NHL contract, with the St. Louis Blues.
The 2021-22 regular season didn’t go quite as well for Todd as the 2020-21 did, but he stepped up in the playoffs scoring 11 points in 18 games as Springfield nearly took home an AHL title. This past season Todd only managed to get into 16 games but he scored a healthy eight goals and 14 points, leading to this two-year deal with the Sharks.
San Jose recently dealt bottom-sixer Steven Lorentz to the Florida Panthers in the Anthony Duclair trade, meaning the possibility is there for Todd to have a stellar training camp and win the Sharks’ fourth-line center role. But the overwhelming likelihood is Todd begins the season with the Sharks’ AHL affiliate, the San Jose Barracuda, and hopes to be healthy and productive enough to earn the first NHL call-up of his career.