Pro Hockey Rumors

With training camps now just a couple of weeks away, the bulk of the heavy lifting has been done from a roster perspective.  Most unrestricted free agents have found new homes, the arbitration period has come and gone, and the trade market has cooled.  Accordingly, it’s a good time to take a look at what each team has accomplished this offseason.  Next up is a look at San Jose.

Expectations weren’t particularly high for the Sharks heading into last season as their extended rebuild continued with their struggles to land another top draft pick.  This summer saw GM Mike Grier be quite active overall, although expectations for the upcoming season will once again be low, as the bulk of their summer activity was adding short-term veterans who could potentially be flipped later in the season.

Draft

1-2 – F Michael Misa, Saginaw (OHL)
1-30 – G Joshua Ravensbergen, Prince George (WHL)
2-33 – D Haoxi Wang, Oshawa (OHL)
2-53 – F Cole McKinney, U.S. U18 (NTDP)
3-95 – F Teddy Mutryn, Chicago (USHL)
4-115 – D Ilyas Magomedsultanov, Yaroslavl (MHL)
4-124 – D Zack Sharp, Western Michigan (NCHC)
5-150 – F Max Heise, Penticton (BCHL)
7-210 – F Richard Gallant, U.S. U18 (NTDP)

Arguably the best forward, if not the best player, heading into the 2025 NHL Draft, Misa adds to an already elite group of Sharks forward prospects. In his third season with the OHL’s Saginaw Spirit, Misa recorded 62 goals and 134 points in 65 games with a +45 rating. Displaying a skating ability reminiscent of former MVP Nathan MacKinnon, San Jose could have one of the scariest forward cores in the league with Misa, Celebrini, and Smith headlining.

Despite having mixed results throughout the 2024-25 season, Ravensbergen is a prototypical goalie prospect, standing at 6’5″ and having the movement between the pipes as if he’s a foot shorter. Throughout his rookie campaign with the WHL’s Prince George Cougars, Ravensbergen managed a 26-4-1 record in 38 games with a .907 SV% and 2.46 GAA, along with six shutouts. Although it’s difficult to project him as a consistent threat for the Vezina Trophy, Ravensbergen has the size and ability to be an above-average netminder at the NHL level.

Outside of their top two selections, the Sharks’ next four picks are all projected to play NHL minutes throughout their careers. It’s a fool’s errand to accurately project the players beyond the first four rounds in any year of the draft, but most pundits consider San Jose’s 2025 draft to be an overwhelming success.

Trade Acquisitions

F Shane Bowers (from New Jersey)
G Alex Nedeljkovic (from Pittsburgh)
F Oskar Olausson (from Colorado)
G Carey Price (from Montreal)
F Ryan Reaves (from Toronto)

Acquiring some insurance for Askarov, the Sharks will become the fourth team of Nedeljkovic’s career. After failing to become an everyday goalie for the Detroit Red Wings, Nedeljkovic spent the last two years with the Pittsburgh Penguins, managing a 32-22-12 record in 76 games with a .898 SV% and 3.05 GAA. While that production doesn’t exhibit much stability, it’s worth noting that Nedeljkovic nearly led the Penguins to the postseason in the 2023-24 campaign, with an 8-2-2 performance to end the season.

Outside of Nedeljkovic, San Jose didn’t add too much on the trade market. Reaves holds nearly zero value as an everyday player, but will add some protection for the Sharks’ crop of young talent. Meanwhile, although each used to be an above-average prospect, Bowers and Olausson have a lot of work cut out for them should they become consistent NHL talents.

One of the Sharks’ biggest trades of the summer came only yesterday, when they acquired Price’s contract from the Montreal Canadiens. Although he’ll never play with San Jose, he affords them a $10.5MM salary cushion should they hope to trade any current veterans for prospects or draft capital. The best part is, despite having a $10.5MM cap hit, the Sharks only owe Price $2MM throughout the regular season since much of his salary was paid out via a signing bonus on September 1st.

UFA Signings

D Cole Clayton (one year, $775K)*
F Adam Gaudette (two years, $4MM)
F Jimmy Huntington (one year, $775K)*
D John Klingberg (one year, $4MM)
F Philipp Kurashev (one year, $1.2MM)
F Samuel Laberge (one year, $775K)*
D Dmitry Orlov (two years, $13MM)
F Pavol Regenda (one year, $775K)*^
G Jakub Skarek (one year, $775K)
F Jeff Skinner (one year, $3MM)
F Colin White (one year, $775K)*^

*-denotes two-way contract
^-denotes re-signing

Heading into the summer months, the Sharks had the cap space to supplement their young roster. In doing so, the team added Klingberg and Orlov to expensive deals to bolster the blue line, while also adding depth forwards like Gaudette, Kurashev, and Skinner.

After scoring one goal and four points in 19 postseason games for the Oilers during the 2024-25 Stanley Cup playoffs, Klingberg doesn’t appear to be the health question mark he was heading into last season. Regardless of his limited availability over the past several years, Klingberg immediately becomes the Sharks’ top option on the right side.

Meanwhile, Orlov lands in the Bay Area after four solid seasons split between the Washington Capitals, Boston Bruins, and Carolina Hurricanes. Throughout that stretch, Orlov scored 31 goals and 125 points in 300 games with a +57 rating, averaging more than 20 minutes of ice time per night. Although he did have a shaky performance with the Hurricanes last postseason, he’s now one of the most accomplished defensemen on the Sharks.

Along with the youngsters who will undoubtedly compete for a roster spot during training camp, the trio of Gaudette, Kurashev, and Skinner should make up for the exodus of depth forwards the team sustained this offseason. Even if they don’t have career years, they’ll raise the Sharks’ floor at the very least, and keep some stability in the bottom six of the forward core.

RFA Re-Signings

F Egor Afanasyev (one year, $800K)
G Gabriel Carriere (one year, $795K)*
D Shakir Mukhamadullin (one year, $1MM)
D Jack Thompson (one year, $800K)*

*-denotes two-way contract

There wasn’t a lot of work to be done on this front this summer. With Mukhamadullin and Thompson still adjusting to the NHL, a short-term contract was the best option for both parties while the team evaluates their potential roles in the future. Meanwhile, the return of Afanasyev from the KHL was a little unexpected. He’ll have a chance to push for a roster spot in training camp and will be waiver-eligible for the first time this fall.

Key Extension

F William Eklund (three years, $16.8MM)

It’s not very often that a team will sign a player to a bridge contract a year before their contract actually expires, but that’s the route Eklund and the Sharks took this summer. The 22-year-old forward has shown lots of promise in his first two full NHL seasons, including putting up 58 points in 2024-25, good for second on San Jose in team scoring. Eklund, the seventh overall pick in 2021, remains a big part of their long-term plans and will be pencilled into a top-six spot once again this season. But he’ll have to wait a little while longer to secure the long-term contract that some thought might have been coming his way next year, while both sides will have more time to assess his long-term upside.

Waiver Claim

D Nick Leddy (from St. Louis)

For the second straight summer, the Sharks executed a rare waiver claim to add a veteran, this time on the back end after getting Barclay Goodrow last year. Leddy dealt with some injury issues last season and didn’t fare particularly well when he was in the lineup. Still, he adds some veteran depth on the back end, and if San Jose can get his game back on track, he could become a viable trade candidate late in the season.

Departures

F Carl Berglund (signed in Czechia)
F Thomas Bordeleau (trade with New Jersey)
F Nolan Burke (unsigned)
F Brandon Coe (unsigned)
F Walker Duehr (signed with Winnipeg, one year, $775K)*
G Alexandar Georgiev (unsigned)
F Noah Gregor (unsigned)
F Daniil Gushchin (trade with Colorado)
F Klim Kostin (unsigned)
F Nikolai Kovalenko (signed in KHL)
D Gannon Laroque (trade with Montreal)
F Andrew Poturalski (contract termination, signed in KHL)
G Georgi Romanov (PTO with New Jersey)
F Mitchell Russell (signed in ECHL)
D Jan Rutta (signed in Switzerland)
D Scott Sabourin (signed with Tampa Bay, one year, $775K)*
D Jimmy Schuldt (signed with Vancouver, two years, $1.55MM)*
D Henry Thrun (trade with Toronto)
D Marc-Edouard Vlasic (bought out, unsigned)

*-denotes two-way contract

Although the Sharks weren’t in a position to lose any big names this offseason, they lost plenty of depth. Still, given the number of additions and influx of young talent, San Jose was in a comfortable position to sustain every departure.

The most notable, if any, will undoubtedly be Vlasic. Becoming a shell of himself since the start of the 2019-20 campaign, Vlasic had only scored 17 goals and 68 points in his last 358 games as a Shark with a -90 rating while averaging 17:09 of ice time per game. Still, giving 19 years of his life to the organization, Vlasic will always be remembered as one of the best defensemen to ever wear the teal.

Outside of Vlasic, the combination of Bordeleau, Duehr, Gregor, Gushchin, Kostin, Kovalenko, Poturalski, Rutta, Sabourin, Schuldt, and Thrun provided the Sharks with 11 goals and 45 points in 223 combined games last season. Arguably, San Jose should be able to replicate, if not improve upon, that production with their additions and promotions this summer.

Salary Cap Outlook

Even with taking on a $10.5MM cap charge with Price, the Sharks still have plenty of cap flexibility heading into the season, with more than $9MM in cap space, per PuckPedia. With them being widely expected to sell at some point, the addition of Price should help keep them comfortably above the $70.6MM salary floor. Meanwhile, with just over $41MM on the books beyond the upcoming season and only one player signed beyond 2027-28 (Eklund), San Jose has arguably the most cap flexibility of any team moving forward.

Key Questions

How Much Will Askarov Play In His First Full NHL Season? When Grier acquired Yaroslav Askarov from Nashville last offseason, he secured what he hopes will be their long-term solution between the pipes. However, he will enter the year with just 16 NHL appearances under his belt, and generally speaking, throwing a young netminder to the wolves on a team that’s not expected to be particularly competitive is risky from a development standpoint. The addition of Nedeljkovic gives them some insurance, but how they split the starts will be interesting to see. Do they try to push Askarov with more of a traditional starting workload, or will it be more of a split so that they don’t throw too much at the young player too quickly?

What Will Happen With Ferraro? For the last two years, defenseman Mario Ferraro has been a speculative trade candidate leading up to the trade deadline, but no move has come to fruition. Now, the 26-year-old is entering the final season of his contract, one that carries a respectable $3.25MM AAV. Grier will need to decide in the coming months leading up to the March 6th trade deadline if he views Ferraro as a longer-term building block, meaning that contract extension talks will be needed. Otherwise, perhaps the third time will be the charm on the trade front.

How Big Of A Next Step Will Celebrini Take? While he didn’t win the Calder Trophy last season (he finished third in voting), 2024 top pick Macklin Celebrini had an impressive rookie year, leading the Sharks in scoring with 63 points (25 goals and 38 assists) in 70 games. Widely viewed as an elite two-way center of the future, can Celebrini take a step forward offensively while also shoring up his defensive play? The sooner he becomes the all-around player he has been touted to become, the sooner one of the hardest positions to fill in a rebuild will be in place. A significant leap could prompt Grier to transition from rebuilding to acquiring long-term additions for the team.

Photo courtesy of Charles LeClaire and David Gonzales-Imagn Images.

PHR’s Brennan McClain also continued to this post.