SAN JOSE — The Sharks are unceremoniously parting ways with one of the organization’s longest-tenured players, announcing Thursday that longtime NHL defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic will be placed on unconditional waivers for the purpose of a contract buyout.

Vlasic, 38, was entering the final year of an eight-year, $56 million contract that carried an average annual value of $7 million. Vlasic was drafted by the Sharks in 2005 and played all of his 1,323 games with the franchise over 19 seasons, but is now set to become an unrestricted free agent for the first time in his career.

“This was a difficult decision to make today, with how much Marc has meant to the San Jose organization for 19 years,” said Sharks general manager Mike Grier, who played with Vlasic in San Jose from 2006 to 2009. “I was fortunate enough to be here with Marc for his first season with the Sharks, and knew he would become a great defenseman.

“Over the course of his career in the NHL, Vlasic was one of the premier shutdown defensemen, earning tough defensive assignments on the ice against the best players in the world and doing it with effectiveness.”

In January, Vlasic became just the 21st defenseman in NHL history to play in at least 1,300 games. With the departure, Vlasic leaves the Sharks second on the team’s all-time games played list, trailing only Patrick Marleau (1,607).

“With over 1,300 games in the NHL, (Vlasic) brought immense expertise and experience to the organization daily, and was selected to represent his country on multiple occasions at the highest level,” Grier’s statement continued. “He will go down not only as one of the best defensemen in franchise history, but one of the best players.

“We want to thank him for his dedication and commitment to the organization, and wish him all the best.”

NHL teams have until Monday at 2 p.m. to buy out players’ contracts.

Vlasic, per PuckPedia, was set to make $3.5 million in base salary this upcoming season with a $2 million signing bonus. The move will save the Sharks $2,333,333 under the salary cap for this upcoming season, although the team already had tens of millions of dollars in available cap room.

Vlasic’s contract will stay on the Sharks’ books for the 2026-27 season at $1,166,667.

While the Sharks save some money under the cap next season, waiving Vlasic also opens up a spot on the 23-man roster and alleviates, to some degree, the team’s logjam of left-side defensemen.

As of now, the Sharks have Mario Ferraro, Henry Thrun and Shakir Mukhamadullin signed through next season. Sam Dickinson, Luca Cagnoni and Lucas Carlsson are also left-shot defensemen who will be vying for roster spots at training camp this fall.

While the Sharks have no interest in handing out long-term contracts to players in their late 20s or early 30s, more moves are on the way. The Sharks, per PuckPedia, have over $44 million in available cap space for next season and will need to expand their payrolls by tens of millions this summer just to reach the 2025-26 salary cap floor of $70.6 million.

The Sharks have finished at the bottom of the NHL standings for two straight years, allowing more goals than any other team in the league in both seasons. Fixing that and supporting incoming goalie Yaroslav Askarov is Grier’s primary focus right now.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do,” Grier said Tuesday. “We’re starting to lay the foundation, but we need to get better on the back end. We’ve got to keep pucks out of our net for sure, but probably priority one, we’ve got to get a goalie to kind of support (Askarov) and push (Askarov) and there’s holes up front too.

“We could use a lot of things. We could use some help up front and definitely use some help on the back end.”

Vlasic, a second-round selection by the Sharks in 2005, made his NHL debut on Oct. 6, 2006, at what was then HP Pavilion in San Jose. He had 20:54 of ice time as the Sharks beat the St. Louis Blues 5-4 in overtime on a goal by Curtis Brown.

Vlasic would go on to become one of the NHL’s premier shutdown defensemen, averaging over 20 minutes of ice time per game for the Sharks from 2006 to the end of the 2018-19 season, which was the last time San Jose made the playoffs. In 2014, Vlasic enjoyed one of the biggest highlights of his career as he helped Canada win a gold medal at the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.

Vlasic’s playing time, though, tailed off in recent years, and this past season, he averaged a career-low 14:38 in 27 games. Vlasic had an upper-body injury that kept him out of the first half of this season, and he had been a healthy scratch several times over the last two years.

After longtime Sharks center Logan Couture announced in April that his playing days were over due to a chronic injury, Vlasic had been the franchise’s last remaining active tie to the 2016 team that advanced to the Stanley Cup Final.

“When you play a long time, injuries happen,” Vlasic said in April. “I’m dealing with one now, but I still play. I still love to play. I was told when I came (into the NHL), enjoy it, it goes by fast, and I tell (young players) the same thing.

“I didn’t believe the players who told me. And now, 19 years later, I’m here and I have a lot less. I have very few years left (compared to before). So I play as long as I can, as long as I still enjoy it, and I still do.”