In just a few weeks, the Seattle Kraken will build their team through the NHL Expansion Draft.
Teams will have the chance to choose players to protect from possible selection and when it comes to the San Jose Sharks, there aren’t a ton of decisions to make. The Sharks will almost certainly use the 7-3-1 protection format, rather than the 4-4-1 format and below is a projection of what we can expect the protection list to look like.
Forwards (7): Rudolfs Balcers, Logan Couture, Tomas Hertl, Evander Kane, Kevin Labanc, Timo Meier and either Ryan Donato or Jonathan Dahlen
Defense (3): Brent Burns, Erik Karlsson, Marc-Edouard Vlasic
Goalie (1): Josef Korenar
I suppose one upside of not having a very deep team is that there aren’t a ton of players to protect. As a result, the Sharks really aren’t poised to lose any key players to Seattle. That said, it’ll be interesting to see who the Sharks use their last protection slot on, likely between Jonathan Dahlen and Ryan Donato.
In terms of who Seattle could select, I’d expect they’ll avoid both Martin Jones and Radim Simek, the only two players exposed who are signed with a cap hit above $1 million. If they do take either of them, the Sharks should be fine with freeing up a bit of extra cap space.
Of the players likely to be left exposed, the names that stick out are whoever isn't protected between Ryan Donato and Jonathan Dahlen, along with Dylan Gambrell. Dahlen was acquired by the Sharks back in 2019 and has been tearing up Sweden’s second-highest professional league for the last two years. He has yet to play in any NHL games but certainly does have potential to be a solid contributor.
Donato was acquired by the Sharks last offseason, in exchange for a third-round pick. He was decent for the Sharks but did fail to make a huge impact, scoring six goals and 20 points in 50 games.
Gambrell, on the other hand, was an exciting prospect for the Sharks a couple years ago with a great 2018-19 AHL season, but has struggled to be much of a factor in the NHL. He scored five goals and 12 points in 49 games and is currently a restricted free agent, but could be re-signed by San Jose before the draft.
You could probably include Alex True in the list of possible selections as well. True has played just 19 NHL games but has put up good numbers in the AHL over the last few seasons.
If I were making the selection, I think I’d be taking whoever is exposed between Donato or Dahlen. Donato is still relatively young and has NHL experience, while Dahlen has yet to play an NHL game but does have a fairly high ceiling.
We could possibly see the Sharks deal one of their forwards before then if there’s someone they don’t want to lose for nothing but regardless, the Sharks don’t have to worry too much when it comes to the expansion draft.
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Who do you expect the Sharks to protect in the expansion draft?
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