The San Jose Sharks young season has started out tremendously well for a team that has had some major surgery. The bottom two lines have performed admirably, despite day-to-day call ups from Worcester, the Sharks minor league affiliate. What makes the bottom six’s performance even more astounding is they have done it without its full cast.
Injuries to Joe Pavelski, Devin Setoguchi and Torry Mitchell forced the Sharks to upgrade players that really have no right playing with as high as they are. The revolving door has worked in Paveliski and Mitchells absence. The Sharks are getting offense from their third and fourth lines that they haven’t enjoyed for years.
The season is still young, but the bottom six would have to play downright terribly for the rest of the season to not surpass last year’s totals. I have been impressed with the play of Jamie McGinn. He has been hitting the opposition at every chance, winning battles along the boards and using his good shot.
The defense has looked the weakest out of all areas, but their play has been much better the last couple games. Jason Demers has been a revelation from the back end, but he has had his fair share of defensive blunders. Kent Huskins has looked lazy and uninspired at times and and at times a force to be reckoned with.
Boyle and Blake will be solid, Marc-Edouard Vlasic needs to be more consistent, but this defense will have its fair share of growing pains.
The biggest plus this season for me has been the play of Patrick Marleau and Evgeni Nabokov. Marleau seems to have finally figured out how good he really is and is finally playing up to his ability. He has the ability to dominate at both ends of the ice, its just a matter of his putting out the consistent effort.
Nabokov was the best Shark for the first few games of the season. The only foreseeable problem for Nabokov might be his work load. Nabbie performs better the more work he gets. Its when there is a lull that he lets in the odd 5-hole goal. As the Sharks start to gel they will dominate more and Nabbie may lose the edge that he was playing with at the beginning of the year.
Heatley has been as advertised, a streaky scorer that is immensely talented. Every time he puts his stick in the air I hold my breath. Heatley scores ugly goals on a regular basis that have no right going into the opposition’s net. Those are the types of goals that are going to propel the Sharks in the playoffs.
A part of me almost wants Joe Thornton and Heatley to never develop any kind of chemistry so Heatley does keep driving to net and scoring those ugly goals that will be so important come playoff time. The other part of me wants to see a 60 goal season from Heatley.
The Sharks are ahead of schedule in their development. Barring injury, it can only get better. Its a good time to be a Sharks fan.
