Speculation: 2022-23 Sharks Roster Discussion Part II

[gaucholoco3]

I don’t understand the argument that retaining on EK costs the owner extra money. It is just cap space that instead of paid to a player on your team is paid to a player on another team. The raw dollars spent doesn’t increase the way that buyouts and LTIR can increase the cost for owners. Any trade of EK takes the rebuild from stealth to in your face and if the point is to rebuild then why does it matter that the cap is spent on a player on another team.

 

[Hodge]

I don’t think Karlsson was close to the reason why we were so bad. Think you can give so much more blame to literally every single player.

I'm saying they don't need to trade Karlsson in order to tank, which is not the same thing as blaming Karlsson for the Sharks being bad. Just pointing out we were so bad despite him having a career year. If we trade him, we'll be the worst team in the league. If we keep him and he doesn't have another historic offensive season (which is likely IMO) we're probably the worst team in the league anyway.

I would like to see Karlsson traded because it seems like the favored outcome by both parties. But if Grier doesn't get an offer he likes, we don't need to force a trade for tanking purposes alone.

 

[stator]

Yep because that’s exactly what I said. You are the absolute master at putting words in people’s mouths.

With Karlsson playing out of his mind and playing a full year AND having Timo playing out of his mind for 75% of the year, they finished fourth worst. Pretty sure the form they had to end the year is closer to what it will be next year.

Like I’ve said at least 20 times now, I’m not opposed to trading him at all. If they are only getting shit back, there’s no reason though.

We need to keep in mind that Karlsson may want to play for a cup competitive team before he retires. Much like Marleau and Thornton wanted. He probably does, and doesn't want to wait until he gets up there in age. He has to know that his contract is the hurdle that needs to be overcome for a trade to happen.

Most here are estimating 4 to 6 years before the Sharks reach the playoffs. His contract is for the next 5 years, and he'll be 37 the season after.

 

[Jargon]

I'm saying they don't need to trade Karlsson in order to tank, which is not the same thing as blaming Karlsson for the Sharks being bad. Just pointing out we were so bad despite him having a career year. If we trade him, we'll be the worst team in the league. If we keep him and he doesn't have another historic offensive season (which is likely IMO) we're probably the worst team in the league anyway.

I would like to see Karlsson traded because it seems like the favored outcome by both parties. But if Grier doesn't get an offer he likes, we don't need to force a trade for tanking purposes alone.

I don’t know what’s going on here but I agree with Hodge.

I will also say that purely from a “we need people to come to our games” point of view, keeping Karlsson makes a lot of sense, since he’s literally the only fun thing about the Sharks right now.

 

[Gecklund]

I'm saying they don't need to trade Karlsson in order to tank, which is not the same thing as blaming Karlsson for the Sharks being bad. Just pointing out we were so bad despite him having a career year. If we trade him, we'll be the worst team in the league. If we keep him and he doesn't have another historic offensive season (which is likely IMO) we're probably the worst team in the league anyway.

I would like to see Karlsson traded because it seems like the favored outcome by both parties. But if Grier doesn't get an offer he likes, we don't need to force a trade for tanking purposes alone.

Ah totally misunderstood. Yeah I agree.

 

[Hodge]

Ah totally misunderstood. Yeah I agree.

Not your fault, I shouldn't have said he has a marginal impact on winning. More like the Sharks are so bad that the difference between keeping and trading Karlsson will have a marginal impact on our lottery odds so I don't think that should be the motivation behind trading him. We'll be a very different team without EK but how much less successful can a team really be than 4-14-4 after the Meier trade?

 

[Barrie22]

I don’t understand the argument that retaining on EK costs the owner extra money. It is just cap space that instead of paid to a player on your team is paid to a player on another team. The raw dollars spent doesn’t increase the way that buyouts and LTIR can increase the cost for owners. Any trade of EK takes the rebuild from stealth to in your face and if the point is to rebuild then why does it matter that the cap is spent on a player on another team.

Because if u retain 3 mil per season on a 3 year contract, that is still 9 million dollars of actual money spent for a player that does not bring in any sort of revenue to your own team but to another teams owner.

If you are retaining salary, it means you are offering to pay that portion of the players salary per year, its not just fancy cap work.

 

[WTFetus]

Because if u retain 3 mil per season on a 3 year contract, that is still 9 million dollars of actual money spent for a player that does not bring in any sort of revenue to your own team but to another teams owner.

If you are retaining salary, it means you are offering to pay that portion of the players salary per year, its not just fancy cap work.

Gaucho’s point is if you’re spending to the cap anyway (which the Sharks did last season), you’re not spending any more money by retaining. That 11.5m has to be paid regardless, whether that be all from Karlsson, or a combination of Karlsson’s retention and his replacements. Sure it feels bad paying a guy who isn’t playing for you, but that’s all it is, feels.

 

[Pavelski2112]

Any argument for Karlsson keeping butts in seats is irrelevant considering the Sharks are basically the lowest team re: attendance that's not the Coyotes.

 

[Cas]

Any argument for Karlsson keeping butts in seats is irrelevant considering the Sharks are basically the lowest team re: attendance that's not the Coyotes.

I also don't know that there's any evidence that star players, in any sport, put butts in seats in and of themselves, save for a few outliers who are an attraction in and of themselves due to being unusual. Karlsson isn't one of those - he's awesome at what he does, but he's still just a hockey player - he's not Babe Ruth.

 

[tiburon12]

Incoming off-season fever dream proposal.....

Step 1:
Leafs lose this series and freak out. Marner gets blamed and tells the Leafs he wants out since he wont re-sign once he's UFA. Sharks also are lucky and win the Bedard lottery.

Sharks trade Karlsson + Barabanov for Marner

Step 2:
MacKinnon thinks Nichushkin's behavior isn't Avs' material and wants him gone. He also doesn't think Newhook has the stuff to be a 2C yet.

Sharks trade Couture (@2m retained) for Nichushkin

Step 3:
Sharks look to pad the team with UFAs who had bad years that they can flip at the deadline, if needed.

Sharks sign Bunting, Rodrigues, Dumba to ~ 3.5x1 deals

Step 4:
Look to unload Labanc and Gregor

Sharks trade Labanc to CHI for a 2023 3rd
Sharks trade Gregor to EDM for a 3rd


Roster for opening night looks like:

Nich - Hertl - Rodrigues
Bunting - Bedard - Marner
Eklund - Sturm - Peterson
Lindblom - Lorentz - Zetterlund

Dumba - Knyzhov
Benning - Thrun
Ferraro - Vlasic

Kakh/Mann/Chrona/Mak


This team will be high scoring with bad goaltending. UFA signings will have strong offensive numbers, which may make them more attractive. Unload Rodrigues, Bunting, Dumba, Sturm, and Ferraro at the deadline.

 

[Stewie Griffin]

I don't understand why some people want us to significantly improve this offseason. Sure, losing is not fun, but if we try to improve before getting a younger future core drafted or acquired some other way, we'll be set up to become a middle-of-the pack team getting eliminated in the first round or just missing the playoffs every year.

Even if we are super lucky and get Bedard, there's still tons of other holes to fill, in every single position.

 

[spintops]

I just do see a scenario that EK65 benefits this team -

He continues to play well and we keep selecting closer to 10. This roster is no where close to contending so it should be bottoming out. Attendance is already pitiful so they can't use that excuse for not rebuilding anymore.

His production drops off or the injuries happen again - Cool we suck, but we are stuck with that contract in 3-4 years from now when maybe we are ready to push for a playoff spot. We also miss out on the flexibility moving his salary would afford us for the next 4 years.

We don't get any futures by keeping him - EK65 is not going to be helping this team 5 years from now when they are actually (hopefully) pushing to win games (IMO). The assets we get for him should help with that goal.

 

[Pinkfloyd]

I don't understand why some people want us to significantly improve this offseason. Sure, losing is not fun, but if we try to improve before getting a younger future core drafted or acquired some other way, we'll be set up to become a middle-of-the pack team getting eliminated in the first round or just missing the playoffs every year.

Even if we are super lucky and get Bedard, there's still tons of other holes to fill, in every single position.

There are but with Bedard, there's just going to be more of a push to compete and rightfully so.

 

[Cas]

There are but with Bedard, there's just going to be more of a push to compete and rightfully so.

Trying to compete just with Bedard is a fool's hope. This team is too far away to accomplish that.

 

[Pinkfloyd]

Trying to compete just with Bedard is a fool's hope. This team is too far away to accomplish that.

The far away part is Connor Bedard. Everything else, provided that we haven't traded EK65, is something that can be acquired a lot more easily.

 

[TheBigDrunkPanda]

We don’t have the cap space to do that.

Yeah didn’t the team just get a cap penalty from Bettman for 25k? They can’t afford to take on additional cap space

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

No point in trading EK for pennies just for cap space since we arent competing. The fewer years left on his deal the more you can get for him

 

[spintops]

No point in trading EK for pennies just for cap space since we arent competing. The fewer years left on his deal the more you can get for him

The 4 seasons prior to this year he played in 56 or fewer games, so this year was somewhat of an outlier. I personally disagree that his value is going to go up further in his age 33-36 seasons while staying healthy then now when he just played 82 games and scored 101 points.

 

[Sharkz4Fun]

I just do see a scenario that EK65 benefits this team -

He continues to play well and we keep selecting closer to 10. This roster is no where close to contending so it should be bottoming out. Attendance is already pitiful so they can't use that excuse for not rebuilding anymore.

His production drops off or the injuries happen again - Cool we suck, but we are stuck with that contract in 3-4 years from now when maybe we are ready to push for a playoff spot. We also miss out on the flexibility moving his salary would afford us for the next 4 years.

We don't get any futures by keeping him - EK65 is not going to be helping this team 5 years from now when they are actually (hopefully) pushing to win games (IMO). The assets we get for him should help with that goal.

There is 0 chance he comes close to a repeat of this season ever again, both in points and health. He was literally the guy on this team and won't be him again on any other team similar to the first 4 years. There is not a single reason that justifies him staying in a Sharks uniform, IF other teams want him.

 

[Pavelski2112]

There is 0 chance he comes close to a repeat of this season ever again, both in points and health. He was literally the guy on this team and won't be him again on any other team similar to the first 4 years. There is not a single reason that justifies him staying in a Sharks uniform, IF other teams want him.

Points I agree but he did change his offseason training this year iirc. I could see him playing another 82 but this year was inflated re: scoring in general so we'll see.

 

[Stewie Griffin]

The far away part is Connor Bedard. Everything else, provided that we haven't traded EK65, is something that can be acquired a lot more easily.

Acquiring 3 top-4 defensemen, a legit starting goalie, 1-2 more top 6 wingers, all while loading up on depth is easy you think?

Even with Bedard...we don't have much else going on for us compared to every other team that could realistically get him. Even Chicago has just as good if not better prospects/youngsters while also having more cap flexibility.

 

[Cas]

Acquiring 3 top-4 defensemen, a legit starting goalie, 1-2 more top 6 wingers, all while loading up on depth is easy you think?

Even with Bedard...we don't have much else going on for us compared to every other team that could realistically get him. Even Chicago has just as good if not better prospects/youngsters while also having more cap flexibility.

We also have to acquire all of this while Karlsson, Couture, and Hertl are getting older and probably less effective and more prone to injury, or leave the team entirely.

If we're really, really lucky, Eklund replaces Meier (with a different package of skills - I mean in terms of overall impact), but that just gets us back to where we were nine months ago (the worst team in the league). Maybe we have two other top nine forwards and two top four defensemen in our current crop of prospects (say Bordeleau, Gushchin, Thrun, and Mukhamadullin), and maybe one of our goalies turns into a decent backup.

Two years from now, we look something like this (imagine roughly equivalent players in some cases):

Eklund - Bedard - XXX
Couture - Hertl - Gushchin
XXX - Bordeleau - Kunin
Gregor - Sturm - Lorentz

Knyzhov - Karlsson
Thrun - Mukhamadullin
Ferraro - Benning

XXX
Makiniemi

Even if you fill those slots with acceptable trade/UFA options (not superstars), this is something like a 225-250 goal team (we scored 233 this year) that allows 275-300 or so (we allowed 315). We'd need a legitimately good goaltender to bring this roster even close to acceptability, and this is almost certainly overly optimistic.

Maybe our prospect luck is better than that, maybe our draft luck is too, but we're just too shallow right now.

 

[Stewie Griffin]

We also have to acquire all of this while Karlsson, Couture, and Hertl are getting older and probably less effective and more prone to injury, or leave the team entirely.

If we're really, really lucky, Eklund replaces Meier (with a different package of skills - I mean in terms of overall impact), but that just gets us back to where we were nine months ago (the worst team in the league). Maybe we have two other top nine forwards and two top four defensemen in our current crop of prospects (say Bordeleau, Gushchin, Thrun, and Mukhamadullin), and maybe one of our goalies turns into a decent backup.

Two years from now, we look something like this (imagine roughly equivalent players in some cases):

Eklund - Bedard - XXX
Couture - Hertl - Gushchin
XXX - Bordeleau - Kunin
Gregor - Sturm - Lorentz

Knyzhov - Karlsson
Thrun - Mukhamadullin
Ferraro - Benning

XXX
Makiniemi

Even if you fill those slots with acceptable trade/UFA options (not superstars), this is something like a 225-250 goal team (we scored 233 this year) that allows 275-300 or so (we allowed 315). We'd need a legitimately good goaltender to bring this roster even close to acceptability, and this is almost certainly overly optimistic.

Maybe our prospect luck is better than that, maybe our draft luck is too, but we're just too shallow right now.

Check all of the bolded to see why I'm pessimistic about that lol

 

[Pinkfloyd]

Acquiring 3 top-4 defensemen, a legit starting goalie, 1-2 more top 6 wingers, all while loading up on depth is easy you think?

Even with Bedard...we don't have much else going on for us compared to every other team that could realistically get him. Even Chicago has just as good if not better prospects/youngsters while also having more cap flexibility.

No one said it’s easy but getting Bedard is harder than any of that. It can be done under the right circumstances but you have to try if you land that pick and is on his elc. Reality is that you won’t wait for all the other prospects to fill spots. Someone like Bordeleau would get moved to fill a spot for example.