How to attack the off-season like a Shark - Part 1

Sharks general manager BRRR revels in the offseason.

He honestly doesn’t care that much about seeing his team at play during the regular season, and then prefers to spend most of his days instead staring at the 90-players roster infographic he carries everywhere. If anything, every game is mostly seen as an opportunity to scout the opposite team’s players and to draft future trades involving those.

July something 2021, the Stanley Cup is finally awarded to some team, then the Sharks GMs wakes up from his long hibernation. Step 1 : the entry draft.

The Sharks drafting strategy is basically a keyword recognition algorithm that crawls through all scouting reports on draft-eligible prospects and award points for certain words and expressions.

High motor

Breakneck pace

Above-level compete level

Grinder

Hard on every puck

Violent

Top Gear

Second and third efforts

Outspeed

Chases hard

Fears nothing

Forecheck

Drive inside

Enthusiastic hitter

Those all sound like poetry to the Quebec-native GM, bringing back memories of players like Brad Marchand, Brendan Gallagher, or iconic MTL Canadiens’ former under-talented grinders like Francis Bouillon, Maxim Lapierre or legendary Steve Begin, whose energy shifts have gone unmatched on the level of “give it all on the ice”

On the other side, any mention of “takes a shift off”, “variable intensity level”, “laziness” or “softness” is enough to have a prospect completely drop off the board of the San Jose Sharks.

With all those keywords duly highlighted in neon colors, the Sharks were ready to attack the entry draft.

The main target at #20 was and had always been Zachary l’Heureux from the Halifax Moosehead. BRRR was already pretty excited when TSN draft analyst Craig Button brought up Brad Marchand as a comparable. Looking at his draft season, it also appears many insiders took offense of his suspension for spitting in the face of a opposing player. But in BRRR’s keyword scale, that turns out to be a +50 thing. Sorry but not sorry, we got our pest.

Plan B for pick #20 was another grinder/power-forward in that mold in the form of Tyler Boucher. The son of former NHL goalie Brian Boucher is a literal hitting machine and his grit got the San Jose Sharks just as excited when he was still available at pick #52. Seconds after the pick, general manager BRRR received a text from longtime Shark defenseman Drew Doughty going : “now THAT is our kind of player”

Some players that scored really high in the Sharks keyword bonus scale unfortunately ended up being drafted by rival teams. Dylan Duke and his special talent at whacking garbage goals as a net-front presence made a good impression on the team and hopefully, the Sharks found a way to bring the USNDP forward home just a few weeks after the draft during an enigmatic episode where GM Oils from the Edmonton Oilers is said to have traded some of his common sense for some excellent craft beers.

Other noticeable draftees that fit entirely the Sharks profile include James Malatesta drafted by Ottawa, a Quebec Remparts forward whose “motor has been stuck on top gear for years now”, Justin Robidas, an amazing skater and coach-pleaser drafted by Buffalo and undersized forward Trevor Wong drafted by St-Louis, known to play “without a care for his safety”. Fortunatly, those guys are maybe still just a phone call away from landing where they belong. And you can be sure BRRR will keep working those lines