The Sharks are off to the best start in franchise history, but not without some close escapes against the Ducks and Coyotes.  Mike and Doug talk about all the games, the Landeskog hit by Stuart, the Sharks ownership change, and Gomez’s start as a Shark.

In other news, here’s a computer wallpaper for the rest of the season.  Thanks Doug’s daughter (with help from Bryce)!

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First Sharks schedule wallpaper is here.  I’ve seen the beginning of of the February design, and it’s awesome.

Thanks Bryce!

The Sharks are off to a blistering start, scoring 10 goals in two games, and easily beating Calgary and Edmonton.  And, as crazy as it might have sounded a week ago, Scott Gomez is now a Shark, but at a very reasonable price.

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Thanks to all those that participated in the fantasy draft last night, our 20-team league should prove to be very robust, and we had a fun chat going on during the marathon 2.5 hour draft.  Given 320 picks, that’s less than 30 seconds per pick, so it didn’t feel like it dragged too much at the time.  I must admit, drafting is my favorite part of fantasy.  Doug was unable to log on, but we traded dozens of texts during the draft, so his fingerprints are all over our team.

I know fantasy is inherently boring to those that aren’t participating, but I’m going to give a couple of reactions to the draft, that may even be amusing to non-participants:

• My favorite pick of the night for SuperDudes: Mikkel Boedker, 1st line LW for PHX, drafted in the last round, 315th overall.
• My least favorite pick of the night for SuperDudes: Travis Zajac in the 11th round (205th overall).  I know he might be on a line with Kovy, but he just signed a cushy deal, gets hurt a lot, and has cracked 60 points only twice.  Nathan Horton probably would have been a better pick here, or even Adam Henrique, who’s also on the Devils, but I didn’t have the balls because Henrique is hurt.
• The best pick of the night: Alex Burrows 6th round (104th overall) by WhyDoIKeepComingBack.  On a top line with the Sedins, Burrows gets some of the most sheltered minutes in the league.  We drafted Bobby Ryan in the 5th, so I’m not super disappointed about our picks before (we would take taken him in the 6th if we could have) but I do think several other teams drafted clearly inferior players in the 4th and 5th rounds.
• The worst pick of the night: Dany Heatley 2nd round (40th overall) by Behind Enemy Lines.  I know he might play on a line with Parise, but his production has been steadily decreasing (82, 64, 53 points the last three years).   I think other teams will key very heavily on that line and deny Heatley the open space he requires.  Some slam dunk 70-point or higher players were still available here, like Thornton, Spezza, St. Louis, and Kane, so I think this is a reach, especially on a team that Hockey Prospectus is forecasting to finish 22nd in the NHL.  And they are projecting 53 points for Heatley.

Next year I think I want to do an auction draft, especially after listening to the Backhand Shelf podcast here.  For the poor bastards that logged into the draft and saw they were picking 15-20, they knew there was no chance they could get some of the best players in the league.  With an auction draft, you can vastly overpay, like the Rangers did for Scott Gomez! Or Wade Redden!  Or Bobby Holik!  Or Michal Rozsival! Or… you get the idea.

The Dudes have so much to talk about, now that the CBA is signed, the schedule is out, and teams are practicing.  Topics this week include Tyler Seguin’s domestic habits, the new Dudes fantasy hockey league, and the Western Conference preview.

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By popular demand, we have opened back up a Dudes on Hockey fantasy league on Yahoo Sports. Click on the logo to get to the league. Here is the Dudes on Hockey Fantasy League CBA: We are going to do one league this year with 20 teams. There will be four divisions of five teams. So odds are someone will have to draft Paul Bissonnette and live the Twitter glory. Eight teams will make the playoffs. There is a live draft time posted on the website. The password to join is ihatekane. This will be the only league this year so have at it Dudes! See you on the imaginary ice.

The lockout is finally over, and the Dudes could not wait to record a new podcast exploring all the details, and talking excitedly about the upcoming season.

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Hello hockey fans and Happy No Hockey Year.A quick update to let you know what to expect from the podcast in early 2013 from your favorite neighborhood Dudes. We have decided to wait and record our first podcast of 2013 when the dust has settled for good on the NHL vs. NHLPA Battle Royale. At this point there are two possible outcomes, a 48 game season beginning in mid-January or Bettman cancels the season like Cop Rock.

The good news is, there’s only another week of this stupidity and then we’ll know what direction we’re headed in as hockey fans for 2013. The Dudes will hopefully be back soon with a mega-episode profiling the ins and outs of the new CBA and a 2013 season preview, or we will be moving forward with full coverage of the San Francisco Bulls and Worcester Sharks for the remainder of the hockey season.

Until then, fellow Dudes.