Since the 2011-2012 drafts (which had Tierney, DeMelo, Kuraly, and Blackwell), the only non-1st round Sharks picks to play 200+ games in the NHL are Kevin Labanc, Dylan Gambrell, Noah Gregor, and Mario Ferraro, and two of those (Gambrell, Gregor) only got there because they were the best options for terrible Sharks teams (Gambrell has already washed out of the NHL, Gregor is still hanging on as a plug).
History has taught us that trading up is almost always right, the only potential exception is targeting under-valued players like Ryabkin, Behm, and Cihar.
Don't forget the illustrious 22 career NHL games from the 2019 draft class.
That was only 5 players and no first rounders. 2020 we had 9 players and 5 made the show but barely.
Linus Karlsson is technically still playing for the Canucks but the 2018 draft also looks like it will produce 0 NHLers.
Same thing though. Only 5 picks. I didn't mind the Merk pick at the time as it was a bit of a luxury attempt at a high risk high reward player. What hurt that draft was trading our 2nd for Polak.
It's just a spectacular run when looked at over the course of 19 picks spanning 3 drafts. You would think that even throwing darts at the Central Scouting rankings you'd hit at least one NHL player with that many throws.
It's bad no doubt but I think most teams have rough stretches. Vegas, for example has gotten a whopping 26 games for them from their last 5 drafts combined.
Yeah but they're Vegas so they still managed to turn Dean and Edstrom into Barbashev and Hertl.
That's probably where DW was at his worse - maximizing the trade value of whatever prospects we had before the inevitably flamed out, although using Norris to get EK was a win in my books.
I'm not missing your point. In order for UFA's to want to resign with your team, they have to feel like your team has a chance to win. There will come a day when the Sharks hold on to those guys at the deadline, but that day is not now and it's not next season either. And a lot of when that day comes around depends on how many of the guys the Sharks drafted and will have team control of are on the team and being serious contributors.
Ok you are COMPLETELY missing the point. I don't want to keep these guys that we're trading. Moving Granny and Ceci and whomever else is left is smart. But by next year, Grier has to get more immediate player help from these moves than more draft picks. They don't have to be stars or seriously established talent, but guys that improve the on-ice product right away and can ultimately be moved in a few years down the road when the team is a more premium destination.
I feel Grier has been doing that to enough of a degree for the team in its current position. Ceci was an example of it. Toffoli is an example for it. Wennberg is as well. We’ll likely do more this off-season.
In order to make moves like that, you have to trade with a team that has surplus prospects at a position you want to improve because teams that make deadline deals want to have more talent on the NHL roster for the playoff push than they had before the deal. Now in a perfect world, would I be happier if the Sharks had traded with the Devils instead of the Stars and brought back a defender that they could plug in on Tuesday to their lineup. Of course. But there aren't as many teams that are both good right now and also have more young talent at a position than they can use right now. We managed to make one trade like that with Nashville, who thought they were going to be good but aren't. If the opportunity comes to make another trade like that, I'm sure Grier will do it, but those opportunities are rarer than getting picks and you only have so much time to wait before you have to make a deal.
While I could see how Granlund was a reclamation project, I'm pretty sure Grier was forced to take him to dump Karlsson.
Agree
I have hopes. But chern and cag of today could well be merkley and wiesblatt and bords. Hindsight is 20/20 but at the very least, we haven't gotten lucky with any real gems outside of the first round in at least a decade. Lightning tanked for Stamkos and Hedman but also got super lucky pulling multiple hofers/all-stars outside of the top 15 in the draft (kuch, Vasilevskiy, point). Similar story for other teams like that (e.g., letang for pens, Keith for chi). It really helps to pull a HoFer in the second round lol
