Sharks’ Grier running out of patience with Sudbury-Musty standoff

SAN JOSE – San Jose Sharks general manager Mike Grier has let Quentin Musty’s agent know that he wants to see the standoff between one of the team’s forward prospects and the Ontario Hockey League’s Sudbury Wolves end sooner rather than later.

Musty, selected 26th overall by the Sharks at the 2023 NHL Draft, requested a trade from the Wolves earlier this month but still hasn’t played a game as the OHL enters the second month of its regular season schedule.

Soon after Musty’s trade request became public, Sudbury’s management said it would only deal the 6-foot-2, 205-pound forward if it were in the team’s best interest.

Musty returned to his home in Western New York after being assigned back to junior hockey by the Sharks on Sept. 30 and has since missed eight of Sudbury’s games. The Wolves played two games while Musty was at Sharks camp and entered this week with a 6-4-0 record.

Musty, 19, would have needed to turn 20 by Dec. 31 to be able to join the Sharks’ AHL affiliate, the Barracuda. He turns 20 on July of next year.

Grier said he supports Musty but doesn’t want to see him sit out much longer as he begins another critical year in his development.

“It’s not ideal,” Grier said Monday at Sharks Ice. “I think we’re trying to support (Musty) as much as we can, but it’s definitely not an ideal situation for him to not be playing. We’re trying to support him the best we can and at the same time, we’ve kind of let the agent know that there needs to be a resolution to this thing here pretty quickly.”

A message left with Musty’s agent, Eric Faion, was not returned.

Grier didn’t want to say why Musty wanted to be traded.

“That’s between (Musty) and his family and Sudbury, so we’ll see,” Grier said. “But hopefully, it gets resolved here pretty quickly.”

Musty led the OHL in points per game in 2023-24, scoring 102 points in just 53 regular-season games for the Wolves. He also scored 10 points in eight playoff games, helping Sudbury advance to the second round.

Musty would like to play for Team USA at the upcoming IIHF World Junior Championships in Ottawa but would seemingly need to start compiling a resume this season to help make that happen. Musty was left off last year’s American team, which featured Will Smith, who captured the gold medal in Sweden.

“From a development (standpoint), it’s obviously not great,” said Grier, who didn’t want to say why Musty wants to be traded. “I think he had good development work here with us in training camp, so I think he was ready to hit the ground running there for Sudbury. But now it’s a couple weeks of not doing anything, so it’s not great.

“I don’t think it’s hindering his development at this point. But if it starts to drag on too long. I don’t think it’ll be great. For him, World Juniors is a goal of his, so he’s going to have to — wherever he goes or ends up going back to Sudbury, whatever it may be — he’s basically going to have a month to try and show USA Hockey that he’s their guy.

“So there’s a little bit of pressure on himself for that.”