It's unfortunate that the Sharks are rebuilding at a time when draft picks are more valued than ever.
Not sure I'd say that. Look at how many future 1st rounders were traded away at this past TDL. From January 30th until the TDL, there were 13 trades with a 1st round pick exchanging hands. If anything, I think that teams are going the Grier model of valuing prospects far higher than ever before and not putting the same value on a young prospect as they are a 1st round draft pick,
We saw that in the Meier trade. STL was willing to offer a pair of 1st round picks acquired from Toronto and NYR (25 and 29 respectively) plus some lower end prospect or pick, but Grier opted for the NJD deal because he valued Muk + 1st + 2nd higher than lower end prospect with a pair of guaranteed 1st rounders.
Issue with SJ is that the 1st round picks have been handed out to others for players without long-term deals or guys with long-term deals that are super cheap (see anyone that TB has traded for). So the issue is that we don't have the assets to trade for those picks rather than those picks not being available. Hopefully the likes of Granlund, Hoffman, etc. are able to build some trade value over the first half of the season while the team is overall bad and Grier can flip them for nice hauls of draft picks from the teams that are eager and willing to give them away.