Welcome back to another season of Sharks hockey, and the return of the Puck Sharks Blog!
After an all too short offseason we quickly return to the grind that is the regular schedule. Being 7 games into the season some very preliminary conclusions can be made of the 4-2-1 start.
First, there seems to be a disconnect in upper management's desire to hand the leadership to the "Young Core", and the coaching staff's view of who the leaders of the team are. I found it very odd that at the Stadium Series press conference Logan Couture, Marc Edouard Vlasic, and Joe Pavelski were selected to represent the team, yet when it came time to announce the assistant captains Logan Couture was left off the list in favor of Patrick Marleau and Joe Thornton (with Pavelski and Vlasic getting the other to A's). At some point you must believe that Todd Mclellan must have made the final decision to hand the assistant captaincy back to Thornton and Marleau as a gesture of goodwill to help repair the riff between them and Doug Wilson. The last point I'd like to make on this subject of leadership is the fact that Patrick and Joe decided to take the whole team to Tahoe (on their dime) and hash out any issues other players had with their leadership style. After calling the locker room culture "business like" its refreshing to see the veterans stepping up and airing the room out on a team trip without the Sharks staff involved, its a big step in the right direction off the healing process.
Second, the Shark's homegrown talent is making it's mark. For a team that supposedly lacked prospects in the minor leagues, 3 rookies (plus a semi-rookie) have made the team out of camp. Chris Tierney, Mirco Mueller, Barclay Goodrow, and Tye Mcginn all made the roster out of camp and have looked liked they will stick (minus Goodrow who is still an injured scratch and have yet to see him). In addition, sophomores Tomas Hertl and Matt Nieto are now fully integrated into the nightly lineup, and look to have increased roles with the team. Tommy Wingels, who had a breakout season last year has hit the ground running with 5 points in his first 7 games. Despite the fact that he has been shuffled around the top 3 lines, Tommy's game has looked very consistent; he seems to have gained some more composure\scoring touch with the puck and continues to log quality minutes without the puck. Tommy looks like he will continue to grow into a mold similar to Joe Pavelski with a little more physicality to his game and I expect to see a 40+ point season out of him this season. Someone I identified as a potential impactful player about 2+ years ago was Chris Tierney, since tracking his development as a London Knight (OHL) it was pretty clear the Sharks had found another diamond in the rough. After seeing his first 6 starts it's pretty clear that Chris has definite top calibre potential, his game is eerily reminiscent of Logan Couture's and has in my opinion a similar ceiling. Chris's vision and hockey sense is very evident in his on ice play, however like a young Logan Couture his physical tools need a little time to develop\acclimate to the NHL level, I see a bright future ahead of Tierney, and look for him to continue to develop into a top flight player. The last rookie evaluation of this section I want to cover is Mirco Mueller, drafted in 2013 Mueller's ascent through the Shark's prospect system has been swift to say the least. It's easy to see why the Sharks moved up in the draft to get Mirco, his skating is very smooth and fluid, his defensive positioning is very good for a young d-man and he has an aggressiveness to his game that Vlasic is only now displaying. As a comparison of a current Sharks, he is very similar to Vlasic's defensive ability but possesses an offensive ability akin to Justin Braun, he still has kinks to work out of his game however he is NHL ready.
Third, the goalies have both shown an ability to steal games and look to push each other for ice time. What bothers me is an apparent lack of faith for Stalock to assume full responsibility of the goalie position, but it should be pretty apparent that T-Mac's preference is to ease rookies into full time roles.
Forth, the veterans still hold a lot (maybe too much) pull among the coaching staff. We have seen Mirco be swapped in and out of the lineup in favor of Scott Hannan, Chris Tierney has also been swapped out in favor of James Sheppard and Thornton\Marleau are still leading the team in ice team. Basically we are seeing a similar lineup as last year plus a few rookies, minus Raffi Torres (who is apparently foregoing a third ACL reconstruction and opting for extended rehab) and no Dan Boyle. I'm left wondering WTF, where is the change promised after the collapse to the Kings, I want Jumbo and Patty on this team but I want more integration\responsibility of youth on this team.
Look for another update soon, where the discussion will turn to some of the characteristics the Shark's team is displaying early, some of which is good and some is bad.
