Sharks Rising From the League’s Depths in 25-26

27 comments

1. Cant stress how important it will be for the Sharks to keep guys like Smith around him. Playmakers need guys to feed to and conversely play off of. Celebrini to Smith has been one of my favorite combos to watch this year. As a Ducks fan i hate to know the Sharks will also be good for years to come. Gearing up for future battles of California.

2. Shannon, thank you so much for your coverage of hockey and the Sharks. I hope that your eye surgery was successful and that you can read this post! You are a blessing to our game, and I hope you stay healthy for many years to come. We love your wife also. Thank you again.

3. I love me some Graf

4. It would be wise to not push for playoffs this year yet. San jose should try to upgrade D.

5. I was hoping for 27 wins total.

   All this is just gravy.

   I think the sharks had the most back to back games in the league. You could see they were gassed the last week before the break.

   So far it looks like their remaining schedule is against much easier (in theory) teams. Very few sharks fans will think the season is a disappointment if we don't make the playoffs except bandwagon fan who don't really know anything about hockey.

6. Barclay Goodrow is probably quite happy that he's not still playing for the New York Rangers.

   Who would have predicted that San Jose would have more points than the New York Rangers at the Olympics break?

7. Their rebuild is ahead of schedule and that’s not necessarily a good thing. Celebrini has 81 pts while their next closest player has 39. Misa and Smith are good but they won’t be total game-breakers like Celebrini is.

   I worry that if they don’t have a couple more bottom 5 seasons they could end up like Calgary, Winnipeg, or Minnesota stuck in eternal bubble team purgatory.

8. The tide is turning and it’s full of sharks. Super cool to see the swing rise happening around celebrini, bedard, and how talent and some wins attract free agents and to be taken off players no trade lists.

9. I see lots of folks commenting on depth. I think the depth is actually there, just under-developed. Celebrini is just WAYYY ahead of schedule.

10. SHARKS SHANNON CONTENT >>

11. Been a fan of the Sharks since they came into the league. I hope they make the playoffs this year, but won't be disappoionted if they do not. The future certainly looks bright and I hope they make some moves to improve the defense.

12. I’d really hope the Sharks can win three games against themselves would look very awkward if they lost all 3

13. Celebrini is way ahead of the rest of the team, but Smith's still almost at a point a game. A team whose second leading scorer is at a point per game is in good shape. I bet there aren't five teams in the league that have that. The hard thing for the Sharks is imagining if they had won the draft lotto last year because Schaefer is exactly the player they need.

14. all ima say is. a few weeks and games with conner mcdavid and crosby next to celibrini might elevate him A LOT

15. i'd say the goals against average reflects lack of puck possession outside the 1st line. That their hits are 13th in the league shows they are chasing the puck.

16. The Sharks have had some exciting wins this season.

17. I can see looking from the outside in that you would mistakenly think this season was about doing the same as the season before. But you are wrong.

    GMMG stated in his locker room clean out presser at the beginning of last offseason that this would be a build year and not a tear down year.

    Your presumption doesn’t match GMMG’s statement or his actions. That’s not to say he won’t move some players but it is to say when he moves players it will be to improve the current and future rosters.

    Not to acquire more futures (picks and prospects). There was never going to be the fire sale for futures you described.

    Their success has nothing to do with what he does at the TDL nor the moves he’s made this season.

    As he stated in his latest presser, he would like to improve the defense and acquire a player or two but not at the expense of his long term plans.

    He stated he would be fine completing this season with what he currently has rather than letting go pieces he believes are part of his plan.

    All of his moves fit into his overall plan for the rebuild. Any player(s) he trades for must fit into his long term plans.

    His recent contracts (Eklund and Wennberg) and his targeted acquisition of Sherwood re-enforces this.

    Sherwood (according to GMMG) was a targeted acquisition and a player he would have liked to acquire previously.

    Sherwood does improve the roster, but the main reason to acquire him was to add a much needed element to the roster for this season and future seasons.

    Any trade that happens by the TDL is to further the build primarily with the playoffs being a bonus.

    Just a fans perspective.

18. 🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈

19. I just don’t see SJ making the playoffs. However, the the strides forward they’ve made this season are impressive. This is a team that will be a Cup contender in a few seasons.

20. As a massive and long term sharks fan, I'm here to tell you that Warsovski is actually an AWFUL coach. He routinely makes baffling lineup decisions (such as healthy scratching Michael Misa for almost the entire first month of the season, or putting idiots like Nick Leddy into the lineup)

21. GMMG has done a good job of sticking to BPA at the top of the draft and taking a lot of low risk-high reward contracts where you win some lose some by their nature… He has also been frankly fairly lucky in the draft lottery as the only time it didn't go his way was when he got Misa instead of Schaeffer… Now Schaeffer would have obviously been ridiculous luck but Misa is totally worth of a 2OA pick so even that is still somewhat lucky to time your "bad luck" in a draft where the second pick is a consesus and not top 2 pick by default

    At this point, he just needs to find 3 top 4 defensemen and hope Askarov continues to grow as I think Dickinson is likely a 2nd pair defensemen with solid top pair as his ceiling… Of course nearly every team in the league is looking for another top 4 D, so this is where he'll earn his salary

22. They seem really close.

    Need to convert more scoring chances & theyve gotta get better on blueline esp in their own end. Way too passive w their marking

23. The Sharks are, for the most part, beating the teams they OUGHT to beat but not the teams they NEED to beat. They're out of the cellar but they are nowhere near the roof. There's a lot of work and development that needs to happen, a lot of growth. But the potential is there and, as a Sharks fan, I feel hope for the future.

24. Hey HG,
    The phrase that I keep coming back to to describe this season is "exceeding expectations." That term applies to Macklin certainly but, it also applies to this years Sharks as a team. I have been a fan for over 30 years now (yikes! Yeah…I am that old now! hahaha) and I was way off in my estimation of what I thought this team could be reasonably expected to achieve after two rough seasons, a young head coach and a flawed roster.

    There were just so many unknowns coming into this season and so much roster turn over and a number of those new faces were not exactly Granlund so I just didn't know if the young guys could make a significant step forward or how many of the other young guys would factor into this season? I also was not super hopeful that many of the veteran players we brought in or the ones we had from last year would be all that efficacious.

    I wasn't wrong on all accounts but, clearly Celebrini blew right past the Sophomore jinx thing. Who could have predicted a 19 year old could grow that much in one off season? Clearly I was wrong and grossly underestimated what this group of players could achieve at least so far.

    I think it makes little difference for the team if they make the play offs or not. I know some of the guys on the team might punch me in the face for saying that but, aside from the value of gaining experience I just think we are not ready to seriously challenge for a real run in the play offs. Not to diminish the value of the experience at all. I just think so much growth has occurred this season that this season can already be called a success.

    I say that because to me it's all about player development and we have grown considerably this season which bodes well for next season and beyond.

    Thanks HG. All the best man!

    Peter St. John
    Clovis, CA

25. Go Sharks!

26. SHARKS !!!!!!!!!

27. What we got coming up into the pros is impressive. Igor, musty, Cags, ravensburg, Cardwell, Pohlkamp, Lund, and more