As more trade rumors abound about the Sharks and Toronto hooking up for another big deal, I wanted to reflect on the one major deal between the two clubs and a subsequent trade that Doug Wilson probably wants to take back.

Remember March 3rd, 2003 when the Sharks traded away franchise poster child Owen Nolan to Toronto for a package that included Leafs captain Alyn McCauley, prospect Brad Boyes and their 1st round pick. The Sharks were in the middle of a dismal 73 point season and a last place finish in the Pacific. Trading their captain for a role player, prospect and draft pick made sense for a team rebuilding – this is not the type of package that Doug Wilson would accept for current Captain and rumor-hound, Patrick Marleau. But then….the interesting move….after posting impressive numbers with the Sharks top farm club (60 points in 61 games) the Sharks traded Boyes and the 1st round pick, the two centerpieces of the Nolan deal, to Boston in a three way deal that netted Team Teal nice guy and current healthy scrach, Curtis Brown. Boyes had 69 points the next year in Boston and has since landed in St. Louis, been converted to wing and currently has 15 goals in 24 games. That draft pick also ended up being young, promising defender Mark Stuart.

Brad Boyes and Mark Stuart for Curtis Brown. Think Doug Wilson wants a do over?

So here’s the segment, me in the “roundtable discussion” on the Teal Spiel, the only existing Sharks radio show. Before I was just your regular schmuck caller, and now I was the schmuck roundtable guy. It was cool to be on with Mr. Rusanowsky- he’s forgotten more about hockey than I’ll ever know. To be honest, after listening to it, I thought I was pretty bland and uninteresting. Great plug, huh? Is it that obvious I don’t have a marketing degree?

Seriously though, it was pretty fun. Might have been a one-time thing, but I’d do it again anytime they’d ask me.

As Grier has said before, Eklund is a nice source of entertainment (no link purposely). He’s right some of the time, but a lot of times he seems to be talking out of his ass. But hey, it’s Sunday! What else are we going to talk about?

So I’m going through my usual hockey blog list, click on the latest Eklund, and see a story on the new ownership group falling through in Tampa Bay… then this:

So does that mean that Vinny LeCavalier, perhaps the best player in the world, could be gone?

…

I talked to another source who told me something that I also believe. “Of course every team out there would cherish Vinny, but a there are a few that would massively overpay for him. Two are of course Montreal and Toronto, but don’t count out Philly, Pittsburgh, San Jose, or LA.”

Of course there’s a firestorm of comments with various trade proposals. One from an Sharks fan that offered Marleau, Carle, Bernier (or Cheech) and a 1st round for Vinny.

For one, It would actually be pretty difficult to “massively overpay” for Vinny if you just offer young players and/or prospects. Outside of Crosby, Kane, Toews, Phaneuf, and AO, it’s more or less a crapshoot. Anybody outside of that group that isn’t an established NHL player yet is a roll of the dice. Some with pretty damn good odds (Sam Gagner) and some not as good (Gilbert Brule).

The trade the Sharks fan offered above doesn’t make a whole lot of sense from the ‘Ning’s standpoint- they would be taking on some big contracts, and the whole point of the trade would be to reduce salary.

So to the Lightning I say: You want young talent? How about this deal: Bernier, Pavelski, Ehrhoff, Greiss or Patzold (your choice) and a 2nd rounder.

I’m trying to hide the fact that such a big trade doesn’t make a whole lot of sense from the Sharks’ perspective either- ownership doesn’t appear to want to gain salary, and we would be adding yet another high-priced center. Unless Patty becomes a winger (and I’m not convinced that’s a good idea) the Sharks would be idiotically deep at the pivot position, and still troubled at the wing.

That being said, Vinny is the clear-cut leader in the Hart trophy race right now. Who among us wouldn’t want to see him in teal?

There was a little extra spring in the Sharks’ step last night en route to their win against Colorado. Joe again was “The Man”™ in scoring two goals and assisting on the third. I actually thought at first that the third goal went in off the defenseman’s skate and not Grier’s, which would have given Joe the hat trick.

It would be easy to launch into a lament here about the lack of secondary scoring and so on, but there were several encouraging things about the Sharks play last night:

• They actually carried the puck into the offensive zone most of the time on the power play. And pretty much every time they did that, they maintained control and set up. Imagine!
• Like the game against the Kings, they weren’t afraid to stand in front of the net. Colorado’s biggest defenseman is now Scott Hannan, who isn’t quite big enough to bang with some of the bodies we got.
• Save the 30 seconds at the end of the second period where Colorado scored that power play goal, I’d say the Sharks played a complete game. Rarely were they pinned in their end, and they were able to keep the puck low and give the Avs fits by maintaining possession behind the net and in the corners.

Always great to see stuff like that, but the inevitable question is, can they keep it up? That’s a question that won’t be answered until Monday against the Avs or Wednesday against the Stars.

I did attend the “Ice Insights” thing last night at the Tank, open to season ticket holders. The four broadcasters for the Sharks fielded questions from the angry mob. And they did seem angry. Stuff like “why the F is Wilson juggling the lines so much”, “who should be benched”, and “who should be traded”. The most interesting answer of the night was when Drew said the three players he would bench were Patty (no surprise), Cheech (<yawn>), and Mike Grier (hey now!). He didn’t have time to elaborate on that, but it was surprising. I’m hoping our Grier might do a Real Grier Breakdown.

This will be our 37th post in November, by far our most prolific month in the history of this blog. Thanks to Grier for helping to make it our best month ever, both in terms of posts and in terms of readership. Though I could have done without that last one.

Someone tell Santa to put this gift under the tree of my fellow blogger. I think Mike would want his in Matt Carle.

Seriously hilarious.

Good article in the Merc today by Purdy that follows up on what we talked about yesterday. Does he have Shaved Ice on his favorite bookmarks?

My diagnosis: They have a climate-control crisis. The team temperature never seems to rise or fall. Behind or ahead, the Sharks operate at the same constant level of intensity. Some nights, that’s enough. Other nights, when the temperature needs to be turned up, it’s definitely not. And of course, when you’re talking about a hockey team’s attitude, you tend to look at the captain. That would be Patrick Marleau. He is the ultimate Mr. Climate Control. A coincidence? Marleau’s biggest asset might also be his biggest weakness. His demeanor seems to stay the same, no matter what goes on around him. He’s never too excited. He’s never too depressed.

Check out the rest below. He makes the similar argument I did yesterday that, with Marleau at the helm, this team may never rev up the intensity enough to take the next step. Marleau knows he plays on the even keel, but his self comparison to Vinny D is pretty off the mark. Vinny has several season of 70+ PIM’s, so I’d say he played with a little more tenacity.

Let’s face it Sharks fans. This team isn’t lacking skill – they are lacking intensity and heart. To allow yourself to get beat two nights in a row AT HOME by a team that is currently assembled of players no one wanted mixed with a few young guys is inexcusable. The fans in our section (props to 124!!) were disgusted by the result and you can feel the Tank is not the home ice advantage it used to be. The Sharks don’t own “Sharks Territory” anymore and the Kings certainly aren’t afraid of coming to town, it might be their favorite place after all. I think I saw Kopitar and O’Sullivan skipping through Christmas in the Park actually. Cute couple.

You can’t teach heart. Some of these guys on the Sharks just don’t have it. We know who Marleau is – a very good skill player without much fire and prone to slumps. When that is who your Captain is – the teams attitude reflect it. When your Captain is Chris Pronger or Brendan Morrow….I think you know the answer.

GM Meeetings are upon us. Doug Wilson, your move boss.

You know what really sucks about last night? The Sharks couldn’t even beat the last-place team in the division missing two of their top three scorers. Kopitar was the only King in the lineup who the Sharks really needed to watch out for, and they didn’t. Kopitar’s goal was a bit of a flukey play in that the puck was just laying under Nabby, unbeknownst to him, but the Sharks launched into their ‘woe is me’ bit again after that. They used the kooky Kopitar goal as an excuse to play like crap for the next twenty minutes or so. Flat-out missed coverage led to the second goal, and the Sharks had to scramble to tie it. Then they sat on their haunches, like they are automatic in OT and the shootout. Note to Sharks: not so much. Nabby looked foolish on all three shootout goals, and it was game over.

On Friday we play a team that will make the playoffs this year, and if the Sharks take a period off like they did last night, we’ll suffer another 6-2 beatdown like we did on October 7th.

So Nick asked in the comments of the previous post:

in my limited-knowledge opinion I think the one name that hasn’t been talked about, but should be, is Cheechoo. I know everyone think back to 2 years ago and how he broke out under big joe but in the end I think history will show that he had one miracle year and fizzled out. While he doesn’t pull a huge contract I think he would be the best form of trade bait despite his poor numbers this year. Your thoughts?

I decided to make a whole post on it, because I tend to get long-winded at times like these.

Let’s talk about the prospect of the Sharks trading a major player first (Marleau, Cheech, Joe, etc.). It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, given Doug Wilson’s history of deliberate moves. I think it’s a unnecessary panic move. Given how stacked the Sharks are with young talent, I don’t think any trade like this would happen this year. Unless the Sharks gain a big time piece that would stick around for several years. This isn’t an aging team that needs to win now.

About Cheech- first of all, being tied for 14th in the league (last year with 37 goals) isn’t ‘fizzling out’ in my opinion. Here are some players who scored fewer goals than Cheech last year ( a ‘disappointing’ year according to some): Hejduk, Zetterberg, Briere, Jagr, Smyth. Let’s not call him a flash in the pan quite yet. Only 1 guy since 2000 has had back-to-back 50 goal seasons, and only 3 guys have had back-to-back 40 goal seasons.

None of that means he’s not having a brutal year so far. Of course he is. As I said in my first Teal Spiel call, I’m not convinced the Sharks’ coaching staff are giving Cheech the best opportunity to succeed. At that time, I thought they were punishing him for playing badly, putting him on the fourth line where he has basically no chance to score. He needs a guy feeding him. Since then, he’s showed a bit more spark, hasn’t spent as much time on the 4th line, and still hasn’t opened it up. He’s working very hard, but the biscuit ain’t going in the basket.

We’re still only a quarter of the season in. I don’t think you trade a guy who’s in a 20-game scoring slump after he had two great years. Reason #1 – you won’t get the best value for him. Reason #2 – it’s bad business. As you said, he’s not breaking the bank, and the Sharks aren’t up against the cap. The problem with the Sharks right now seems to be lack of scoring- why would we want to dump our top scorer the last two years? Even if we package him with other players or picks for a truly elite scorer, is that really going to make enough of a difference? Best case is we’d gain 50 goals (if we’re damn lucky) plus a huge contract and lose 30 goals and a cheap contract.

So here’s my prescription. You don’t trade Cheech this year, regardless of what happens. He goes half a season with 10 goals, you put him on the fourth line again, you put him in the press box, and you hope the disincentive pushes his buttons. He’s a ferociously competitive guy. I’ve seen it personally at Sharks practices. He’s the first guy that knows he’s sucking, and the last guy that wants to drag his team down. If that mentality changes AND his output stays horrible, you consider trading him after the season is over.