Yesterday, we noted that the trade noise involving Vancouver Canucks defenceman Vincent Desharnais that seemed to be starting to heat up. Today, those rumours got a lot more concrete and noteworthy.

On Thursday, Rick Dhaliwal of Donnie and Dhali — The Team shared that a couple of people had told him that Desharnais’ name is out there. And in the latest edition of the 32 Thoughts blog, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported the following.

No insider speak with words like “I think” or “I wonder.” Just laid out point blank for all to see: the Canucks are trying to trade Vincent Desharnais in an effort to find a better fit.

Clearly, the start of Desharnais’ two year deal with the Canucks, signed this past offseason, is getting off to a rocky start. Desharnais’ $2 million AAV both this season and next, combined with his lacklustre play so far this season, certainly make him a difficult player to move; but we’ve seen the Canucks get out from under bad money before with this management regime in charge.

We’ve also seen them do a player a solid after it becomes clear he’s not going to work out in Vancouver. Just recently, the Canucks traded offseason free agent signing Daniel Sprong to a familiar situation with the Seattle Kraken after Sprong played his way out of the Canucks’ top six and firmly into Rick Tocchet’s doghouse in just nine games. Sprong was rotating between the fourth line and the press box, and in an effort to “find a better fit” for the player, the Canucks flipped Sprong to the Kraken for future considerations.

Could Desharnais be headed in a similar direction? Time will tell, but we now know that the Canucks are out there looking. The question now is: will they find a dance partner?