Let’s take a look at the San Jose Sharks for the 2013-14 season in an unconventional way. I mean, you don’t come to PuckBuddys to read the news all conventional-like, now, do you?

THE WILLING

• Dan Boyle
• Joe Thornton
• Patrick Marleau
• Marc Edouard-Vlasic
• Scott Hannan
• Brad Stuart
• Tommy Wingels

The crew that puts the ‘do’ in… ‘play hockey’.

Well damn, that didn’t work, did it? Anyhow, these are the guys that provide a powerful combination of skill, grit and determination to get a hockey game won, sometimes even when the win isn’t deserved by the team as a whole. Thornton and Marleau have, in years past, been the main scoring punches for the Sharks, but as they put age 30 increasingly in the distance, it seems reasonable to expect their roles on the team to change from being the offensive threats to more able-bodied veteran and mentor roles on the bench. This crew also includes folks like your trusty stay-at-home defense, as well as a pinch of some grinding forwards, to try to put the opposition on tilt.

THE ABLE

• Logan Couture
• Joe Pavelski
• Brent Burns
• Antti Niemi

Scoring finesse from Couture and Pavelski are simply cornerstones of the success (or lack thereof) for the Sharks in the upcoming season.

Along with Burns, who brings more of a pounding, punishing touch as a forward, these are the players the Sharks will need to step up ever more urgently as the gray hairs emerge for Thornton, Marleau and especially Boyle.

Niemi. I mean, he’s the man. Niemi is THE starting goalie. In recent years, San Jose has had the opportunity / problem of having both starting and backup netminders as potentially #1 caliber players, but certainly not right now. The better parking spot goes to Niemi, unquestionably. More after the jump.

THE… LESS-ABLE

• Martin Havlat

Poor Marty. I don’t mean to be a total tool about it, I really do want the dude to get better and hope he can contribute!

But conventional wisdom in Sharks circles is that Havlat likely would have been shopped this off-season, if only he were healthy enough to be moved. Due to being on IR, however, Havlat and his history of being so inopportunely injury-prone (like, say, during the opening series of the postseason, as in 2013) remain on the Sharks’ roster for the foreseeable future. Havlat is expected to start the season on IR, and we’ll see where that leads.

THE RE-UP-ABLE

• Todd McLellan

Coach Todd seems to retain the full confidence of Sharks management, as he was awarded a contract extension over the summer. Parts of Sharks Territory are not happy with the results McLellan has managed to oversee, but I think by and large, this is viewed as a good move. Count me in that camp.

THE ADOR-ABLE

• Jason Demers

Because French-Canadian guys. I mean, seriously.

THE UNST-ABLE

• Raffi Torres

If you think he’s an awful hockey player, you’re just mad he’s not on your team. I’m OK with that, and you should be, too.

THE REASSIGN-ABLE

• Alex Stalock
• Harri Sateri

One of the more interesting things about this off-season was following the goalie situation (as in just who is going to back up Antti Niemi).

What’s more, per CapGeek, the *only* player currently on the Sharks roster with a two-way contract is Alex Stalock. It seems clear that he and Harri Sateri will be competing against one another for the role of backup netminder for San Jose — which means the only two guys on the roster who can be sent down to the Sharks’ AHL club, at least to start the year, will likely be the two backup goalies. I wouldn’t go so far as to call that a hindrance as far as roster management, but it does suggest there is decidedly *not* going to be a “Worcester Shuttle” as there has been in years past.

THE RENAME-ABLE

• HP Pavilion SAP Center

The Shark Tank remains the Shark Tank, but with new sponsorship on the label! Be sure to dazzle and impress at your next cocktail party with the knowledge that HP Pavilion has been officially renamed SAP Center at San Jose.

Looking back at January, and the very real possibility of an altogether lackluster season for the San Jose Sharks, I don’t see how — OK, aside from the massive losing streak and early playoff elimination — you look at what the Sharks managed to do this season and be all that disappointed. The team opened the season with a franchise-best nine wins before their first loss — not to mention Patty Marleau tying the all-time NHL record with goals in each of the first four games of the season. Talk about a statement from Captain Gutless, eh, JR?

From a management and roster perspective, the big story of the regular season was, of course, the big names, both traded away and acquired: in particular Doug Murray (to the Penguins) and Ryane Clowe (now a Ranger). Now, I love these guys to death, but those moves were astonishing in their addition-by-subtraction nature.

The team had simply gotten too slow to compete in certain facets of the game, and what a hat tip is due to management for pulling the trigger and moving these guys. The decision to make those changes had to rest on confidence in a number of areas including how well the team can do with the spades of draft picks now available to the Sharks in both 2013 and 2014, as well as the more immediate issues of trusting available to call-ups from Worcester, and the ability to make a move for another key piece or two to help build a complete team. Like picking up Raffi Torres (*ducks and covers* — we’re getting used to doing that here in Bay Area, not on account of the earthquakes, but rather how y’all tend to throw things and boo and hiss when we drop that particular name).

As any Sharks fan knows, the nail biting really gets underway in the playoffs. The first round this year, however, the boys in teal were a whole lot of fun to watch. After attaining the 6 seed in the west, the Sharks proceeded to sweep the Vancouver Canucks in the first round. (Sweep! And I don’t mean that to be a swipe at Vancouver, at least not any more than it obviously is.) In doing so, the Sharks, no doubt, shook off some playoff demons and nightmares from match-ups past. And rudely provided fans and media, both, with what eventually turned out to be false hope about the prospects for the match-up in round 2.

I really don’t mean to come down too hard on the team here. The Sharks did indeed take the defending Stanley Cup champions to a seventh game in the conference semi-finals. Yes, they lost that game, in a grinding 2-1 defeat. But as a fan, you sense something unusual: a feeling of disappointment THAT the team lost, which is a real departure from years past, where the disappointment was aggravated by HOW the team lost. Team Teal has certainly done itself no favor in trying to shake the title of “chokers” during its previous eight consecutive years’ worth of postseason appearances.

In this year’s playoffs, though, it seems like this Sharks team finally managed to rid the franchise of that albatross; at the very least, I felt like they at least began to make that case, short of winning it all. This team was not one you could say went down without a fight. In fact, we saw a team that stayed in the fight, and that took that fight all the way down to the wire. They lost in game seven, they lost by a goal, and they lost by playing one hell of a series, after simply demolishing a familiar and fearsome foe the series before.

No, that doesn’t change how playoff elimination, especially in a close seventh game, is a gut-wrenching experience. I’m not trying to be a soothsayer in that regard. But, as I wrote at the very beginning of the season, this is not a team in as bad a shape as some people would have you believe. The coaching staff has, I think, proven themselves worthy. As the roster evolved over the season, it, perhaps improbably, became an entirely better lineup than at the beginning of the year, despite a lot of people thinking the roster was in more or less intractable shape.

The cabinet of prospects, bare as could be back in January, is now flush with picks in what was going to be an otherwise slim couple of drafts in 2013 and 2014. Leadership among the team seems to be managing an incredibly graceful transition: Marleau, Joe Thornton and Dan Boyle — all UFAs at the end of next season, as it happens — as the grizzled vets providing guidance and voices of experience, with Logan Couture and Joe Pavelski well-poised to take the reins for the future, playing in front of Antti Niemi who’s under contract in net for the next couple years yet.

Another season gone by, culminating in playoff disappointment for the San Jose Sharks. You’d be right to suspect frustration as the primary outcome. But if you ask me, the future is looking a good bit brighter than it was at the start of the season, and that’s an altogether pleasant surprise. Of course, every Sharks fan wants to see the boys win a Cup, but if this is plan B, it sure beats some of the other options, like just blowing the team up.

Finally I know I speak for all of us here in the Bay Area when I wish good luck to the Bruins and the Blackhawks as they head into Game 2 in the greatest sporting battle of them all, the Stanley Cup Final. May the half-a-championship* go to the best team, indeed.

* – I’m kidding, I’m kidding! You people are so sensitive about the impending record-book asterisk, aren’t you!?

My initial concern was (of course, in retrospect) unfounded. I absolutely don’t have a problem with a team hosting a night to recognize their LGBT fan blocks — we exist, and thank you for acknowledging that! — but I was looking forward to a night specifically to celebrate and encourage and support athletes who happen to fit one or more of the LGBT letters, whether or not they’re still in the closet. The message of acceptance that is the laser-like focus of YCP fits so well in a pro sports arena, and I felt a little let down to learn that it was going to be what I imagined would be “just” a big gay rainbow rah-rah affair.

I’m not afraid to admit to being a bit of an idiot (of course! in retrospect) for having any concern at all about the wholehearted and honest embrace a hockey team bearing the name of San Francisco would give their LGBT fans; foolishly unfounded concern, in fact, when I was well aware that very same organization had the stones and delightful audacity to join in an event that was exactly as it sounds: Drag Queens On Ice. No, really.

LGBT Night at the Cow Palace, Saturday, March 23, was a total blast, done to the nines by the Bulls organization. The 4-1 defeat was a letdown, but our section was rocking! I had the pleasure of sitting near several people who counted this as their very first hockey game, so in addition to heckling the refs and jeering nearby folks in Stockton Thunder gear, there was some serious hockey evangelism taking place in the stands:

“Wait, is that legal?”
“As long as you don’t get called for it.”

Or

“Why did play just stop?”
“Icing!”
“Oh. Um, what’s icing?”

Yeah, that awkward moment: trying to explain icing to a noob. Totally happened.

The Bull’s fantastic YCP video was featured on the scoreboard during intermission, which received a rousing cheer from around the rink.

Later, Chuck-A-Puck ensued. Strangely, although I share a name with the game, I didn’t win. Yet again. I never do, alas.

I’m ashamed to admit I’d never been to the Cow Palace before, but I was generally charmed by the venue and the way it operates on game day — especially the mechanical bull, which is an entirely apropos and hilarious feature!

We had fairly inexpensive seats, yet the views were great — a fraction of the cost of seats with similar distance to the ice in an NHL arena. In fact, if anything, I thought our seats were a bit low to the ice! Reasonable ticket prices freed up the concessions budget, which is always appreciated, and ever so important, given the expansive beer garden behind the end boards.

All event staff I interacted with were incredibly friendly and outgoing, and the atmosphere was much more easygoing and loose than the NHL experience, where there’s an intensity that follows the game at its very highest level. Free shuttles to BART / Muni made getting to and from the Cow Palace a breeze.

As both a hockey fan and a (very amateur) player, I thought the game was so interesting to watch. It was so cool to see how the ECHL doesn’t deliver perfect hockey — and I don’t mean that as a bad thing in the slightest. If you’re used to watching the NHL, it’s the story of the day when a play goes wrong. Watching possessions develop at the ECHL level was a totally different experience. Passes that aren’t always on target, and sticks that aren’t always in just the right place completely change the game. There’s a fantastic unpredictability when you watch and always have to wonder if the play is going to break down.

Thanks to the San Francisco Bulls for inviting all us hockey lovin’ homos into their house for the evening. I hope everyone else in attendance had as good a time as I did! I’ll definitely be back soon, and wish the Bulls all the best of luck in the upcoming Kelly Cup playoffs!

Not that you should believe the playoffs are in the picture; per the preseason power rankings at ESPN, where the Sharks get burned, appearing in 23rd place, just above Edmonton. Ouch.

So let me ask you to stop shoveling dirt for a moment, and make a good old homer-tastic prediction: San Jose is actually going to squeak into the playoffs this season. To go with that, a decidedly un-homer pair of predictions: their window for the Cup has closed, and the team is probably about a year or so from getting blown up.

The Sharks are going to make the playoffs. It’s a largely unchanged squad from last season, once Brent Burns is back from surgery recovery and yeti training camp or whatever explains his most recent team head shot, and Jason Demers’ hand is fully healed. In this shortened season, so long as the squad manages to stay healthy — a big stipulation — then they should be well suited to hit the ground running.

Todd McLellan

Staffing is largely the same, coaching is largely the same. That stability counts when you have almost no prep time and each game is almost double the fraction of the season it normally is.  The shortened season also acts to mitigate one of the major concerns of the Sharks: the aging core of the team: Joe Thornton, Patrick Marleau, Dan Boyle, and Ryane Clowe are all a year older. (So is everyone else, of course, but they’re not he ones taking heat about age being a detriment.)

But we’re playing a 48-game season here, so — and again, this is a big stipulation — as long as injuries don’t plague the team because of the compressed schedule, the grind of the full season won’t have time to wear the team down as it usually would for the playoffs.Anecdotally, this team seems to like to hit a fairly lengthy midwinter streak where they string together a bunch of wins. There’s no science or math in this, so take it with a grain of salt, but based on the shortened time frame of this calendar, if that streak comes again this year, it could happen at a very good time: the final push to the playoffs.

Rumors are louder this year than in the past that the core of this team may not make it through the season. I suspect these calls to blow up the team are a still a bit premature, but probably not by much — though of course if things have gone horribly wrong by the trade deadline, all bets are off.

I think there’s one more year or so left with the current roster in place. Look at it this way: Doug Wilson loves to make deals. He loves to move the pieces to try something new. Since the end of last season, though, not a whole lot has happened to that end: free agents Brad Stuart and Adam Burish were signed to deals by San Jose; several UFAs were allowed to walk.

That is not DW-level deal-making, kids. If blowing up the team was the best move at the end of last season, we’d at least see some bolts being loosened so that things fall apart this year. You’ve got to figure that means he (and/or ownership) thinks the team is pretty much in as good a shape as it can be for the season ahead. But that also suggests rightly that the cupboard is pretty bare. Major changes are on the horizon, no doubt, but as long as the team is looking at a realistic chance of making the playoffs, it happens after the Cup is awarded at the earliest.

The Sharks have the experience, a system that they’ve managed to ride to the playoffs several years running, and a staff that’s largely unchanged. I think that plays in their favor given the challenges the short season of 2013 presents, so I’m going with “they’re in”.

For essentially the same reasons as above, though, I think history has shown that situation, which works to get to the playoffs, doesn’t seem to convert to playoff hockey with the same effectiveness. I won’t point fingers and issue blame. Yet. That’s what the post-season writeup is for. But I think the experience is also there to suggest that, without some changes, what’s currently in place is not going to cut it when it comes to winning a Stanley Cup.

And if I’m wrong about that last prediction, what the hell, it’s feasting on crow, dressed head to toe in teal, at a Stanley Cup championship parade in San Jose. I can totally live with that.

Now LET’S DROP THE PUCK!

That said, I should probably just go ahead and come out. No, not like that — the masthead says it clearly enough, “boys who like boys who like hockey”. (Heyo!)  What I mean to say is that I play inline hockey. While I’m sure that’s bound to bring a wave of scorn and derision from the rest of the hockey-playing PuckBuddys crew, the jeers are welcome, because hockey’s just too much fun to care!  There’s volumes to be written on comparing the two sports, and maybe someday we’ll get around to it. A good topic to keep in the hopper in case, say, we happen to have a distinct lack of NHL-related things to cover. *cough cough*

But enough about that.  I’m so glad to be able to write my intro post here to mark a year of playing hockey myself, but far beyond that, it’s been a crazy year around the NHL, the hockey world, and here in Sharks Country.

The You Can Play Team has formed, with the mission of ensuring sports are an environment where it’s safe and cool to be a gay person. And aside from the awesomeness of the project in general, of specific interest to the Sharks community is that the Team is led by one of our own, Tommy Wingels. Inspiring, heroic stuff on his part (and speaking personally, much appreciated)! I know, I could go on, but it’s preaching to the choir around these parts. Ya’ll just go get you some Wingels jerseys, OK? And a YCP T-shirt, of course!

The Sharks had a grueling end of the 2011-12 regular season, topped off with a home-and-away versus the dastardly LA Kings, which also turned out to be a battle for 7th and 8th seed in the Western Conference playoffs.  Our lovable team in teal twice beat the Kings, earning the supposedly-better 7th seed, leaving the Kings to fight the harder battle from 8th. Long story short, the Sharks totally bounced in the first round and did not win the Stanley Cup.*

It’s the endeavor of the Sharks organization to finish turning the corner it feels like they’ve been trying to turn for several years now, dating back to around the time Sharks GM Doug Wilson pulled off one of the Most Awesome of Awesome Trades(tm) to acquire one “Big Joe” Thornton. The Sharks are, of late, such an exciting team to follow in the regular season, making almost every game entertaining and a worthwhile watch (not to mention justifying the cable bill!).

I wrote a whole paragraph here about playoff disappointment and all the same stereotypical — and, sadly, empirically true — things about the Sharks, but no more of that, eh? Beat that disappointment, elevate the game, particularly in the playoffs. Shut everyone up by making a deep run. That’s the goal. That’s the charge. Go, fight, win. Eighty-two games to get in good position, then sixteen hellaciously hard-fought postseason victories. That’s the mission from here, boys and girls.

I can’t wait to see how it goes this time: “next year” is just, if you can believe it, a half-dozen weeks away. And I’m so, so excited to be a part of the PuckBuddys team, to chronicle the NHL season that’s about to commence for the San Jose Sharks, and have a blast with all of you while things unfold.

Well, unless there’s a lockout… :)

* – The Kings had a somewhat different outcome of their postseason, you may recall. They did not, in fact, bounce in the first round and did, in fact, win the Stanley Cup. Funny, that.