This week on San Jose Hockey Now: the NHL Trade Deadline has come and gone. What do we think of all the San Jose Sharks moves, including our thoughts on Walman and Zetterlund being traded?
First we cover all the trades made by San Jose Sharks GM Mike Grier in the days leading up to the deadline (3:05).
We discuss all the possible reasons behind the Jake Walman deal and why Grier seemingly sold a player at the peak of his value (4:08).
The Zetterlund trade to Ottawa caused quite an outpouring of emotion from the fanbase. How do we see the value, both on and off the ice, that was traded with Zetterlund (18:35)?
We cover all the other trades briefly, including a surprise Sheng-favorite that got traded. Hint: this time it isn’t Luke Kunin! (46:05)
Finally our trade deadline grades for the San Jose Sharks finishes the episode. (1:04:43)
Thanks for watching!
13 Comments
Appreciate you guys as usual… Losing Zetterlund is hard but he was the 6th best forward on the worst team in the NHL and got a second round pick and a prospect that quite a few people are still high on and fits the timeline better… Dont fully understand the fanbase losing their minds over this, I think they overvalue a 40 point one way winger…
What UFA's are going to come to SJ next year. They are going to overpay and give extra term for flawed players. The good vibe narrative is gone and 2026 is going to be another beat down season.
Something that didn’t get noticed on deadline day is that New Jersey signed Kovasevic to a 3 year extension. New Jersey now has three RHD with salaries between $4-9 million for three more seasons and they all have no trade clauses.
That means Simon Nemec is officially available. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a deal in principal already in place with Grier.
Bystedt’s name was obviously missing in Grier’s quotes about Ostapchuk. I’d think he would be included in the deal which could look like:
-Bystedt
-Mid-level LHD prospect like Cagnoni or Sahlin Wallenius
-Dallas 2025 or Edmonton 2026 first round pick
-2025 or 2026 second round pick
I'm worried that GMMG is setting us up for another tank year. I was hoping we'd start to turn the corner after this year but now we need to replace a top 4 d man and a 20+ goal scorer. Not sure how he'll manage to attract any decent free agents with the cap going up so much and it also seems like he only knows how to ice the worst roster in the history of the cap era so I'm not confident with his roster building either.
Kind of worried our GM is a wrecking ball with no plans of actually building anything.
Man I would have done that Henri Jokiharju for a 4th trade all day… wish that was one of ours
Keep up the great work guys!
Walman? Fair value. Granlund? Fair value. Blackwood? Fair value. Kunin? Fair value. Sturm? Right thing to do. Desharnais? Don't know. Vanacek? No. Zetterlund? No.
I'd be much more intrigued by Ostapchuk if we were looking at a Charlie Coyle level guy instead of a Goodrow level guy. If he makes it. Zetterlund for a Coyle-level sort of prospect (even with a bit more added on top of Zetterlund) makes more sense to me. If Ostapchuk becomes a Coyle-level player, its a massive win.
Sheng, you are correct that Walman and Zetterlund were "flawed players" from the GM perspective, and it was a matter of Mike Grier giving them both a good chance and discovering they were not his kind of player. Team identity matters in explaining these trades which contradict fan expectations. Both Walman and Zetterlund were inconsistent and mercurial rather than reliable and steady performers. Both kept making bad turnovers in key times. Almost all pro hockey players are flawed by the way, if Grier is searching for perfection then he will never rest. I am very happy that Sharks kept Mario Ferraro and did not give up on other prospects in their system. Grier is definitely upsizing the future Sharks team and adding weight to the team, but bigger players are also slower. Noah Gregor had some speed so maybe he will find a legit role on the new Sharks. Work ethic or competitiveness will decrease on Sharks as they traded away some of their hardest working players at the deadline, so Warsofsky will have to rebuild this habit on new faces.
Having trouble nailing this down. Since the sharks were last place and won lottery. Does that count against the 2 wins in 5 years. I’ve seen that last place and win. Does not count against. Since there’s no move up. But can’t find concrete answer. Do you guys know.
Are sharks at 1 of the 2 possible wins. Or are we still at 0 since we didn’t move up?
"Fabbe" (pronounced Fah-beh) is a nickname for Fabian, btw. Fabian is pronounced "FAH-bian" too, not "Fay-bien".
Zetterlund and Walman were currently big pieces of the Sharks.
2, 3 or 5 years down the road, Zetterlund might be on our 3rd line and Walman even he didn't slow down at all might be on the 3rd pair.
It kind of hurts in the very short term, because we have so little that is ready now.
Down the road, neither of these are impact portions of the rebuild.
That's my take.
Zetterlund was a fan favorite… but on a contender he’s a 3rd liner. With the amount of top tier talent coming in, it didn’t make sense to pay him what he wanted. Sad to see a great person go but it was the right move