Some key pieces for the Sharks this season.
Harper Cotie
Boys in the Booth co-host Casey Abrams said recently, that he feels the San Jose Sharks’ time to win a Stanley Cup is over. That thought process changed after Doug Wilson and the Sharks made the biggest move of this off-season, by acquiring defenseman Erik Karlsson from the Ottawa Senators only 11 days ago. The Sharks landed the superstar defenseman, along with prospect Francis Perron from the Senators for a big haul, obviously. The Sharks gave up forward Chris Tierney, prospects Josh Norris and Rudolfs Balcers, defenseman Dylan DeMelo, a conditional first-round pick in 2020, a conditional second-round pick in 2019, and two more conditional draft picks.
Before this trade, the Sharks had a pretty good off-season, locking up core players like Logan Couture and Evander Kane to long-term deals. Not to mention that the Sharks brought back veteran Joe Thornton on a one-year deal for less money than what he made last year and dumped a bad contract in Mikkel Boedker to, guess who, the Senators. Last season the Sharks suffered a second-round exit in the playoffs, courtesy of the Vegas Golden-Knights.
The year before, the Sharks were downed in six games by Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers. However, in 2015-16, the Sharks’ finally made it to the Stanley Cup finals under first-year Head Coach Pete DeBoer and a hot goaltender in Martin Jones, who won a Stanley Cup as Jonathan Quick’s back-up, with the Los-Angeles Kings. Looking at the Sharks ahead of the 2018-19 NHL season, now with Karlsson, the Sharks’ are a lock to win the Pacific Division in my opinion.
This team now has two Norris Trophy winning defenders in Erik Karlsson and Brent Burns. These two have also led the league in points by defenseman for the last five seasons. Karlsson joins a strong core in San Jose, with the likes of Burns, Thornton, Couture, captain Joe Pavelski, and Marc-Edouard Vlasic. These guys know how to win and they’ve been close. There’s no guarantee that Karlsson will re-sign at the end of this season. It’s going to be tough to afford him, given the fact that this is a contract year for Pavelski as well.
Karlsson could very well be a rental, but as long as the Sharks’ have him, along with what they already have, there’s a serious chance that the Sharks’ could win this season. After all, it could be there last chance.