Origins of this trade have been chronicled well over the past few days between both Pollak and the Merc and FTF. It was supposed to go down earlier this week, but Wallin used his NTC to try and get an extension out of DW. Carolina fans seem think highly of him, and we need help on the blueline to be sure. I'm glad we didn't have to send anyone the other way. I do wonder if we have any picks left in the early rounds, but that's just me being overly whatever about picks.

He'll be in the lineup against Toronto on Monday.

Welcome to the team Niclas!

Update:

Still trying to sort out how I feel about this move. We DO really need help on the blue line, and none of our guys went to Carolina, so, I like it for those reasons. He's only here for the year too (rental anyone?) and isn't too pricey. But he puts us either at or over the cap and he shuts down the Woostah Shuttle. I like McGinn and want him back. Same with Not Kyle. Not being able to shuttle those guys back and forth as needed means we've lost a substantial amount of flexibility when it comes to injury management for the rest of the regular season. Plus, does his sudden addition means Pickles is worse off than we think injury wise? I also like draft picks. Why do we keep giving those away. I have this uneasiness about this trade, and I can't quite figure it out. Guess I'll just have to wait and see what happens.

I swear DW, if you trade away Clowe I will be very bitter with you for several minutes. Consecutively!

Haven't done one of these in awhile. Time to start back up.

First off, some silly business:

Is Nashville trying to be SJ? Your players skate out of a giant cat head, I heard the "hey _____ YOU SUCK!" cheer last night, and you have Tootoo whistles? What? There is no Tootoo Train! Stop trying to steal our mojo. We had those weird ideas first! Next thing you know they'll be doing the chomp on the power play.

And now, something completely serious.

Coming off a solid win against the Blues, it was frustrating to see that the Sharks weren't all there last night. The team still lacks consistency which is ridiculously annoying. Being consistently inconsistent is a start, true, but not a very good one.

Nabby gave a clinic last night on why he's an awesome goalie. Some of his stops were absolutely amazing and being that the team in front of him wasn't playing their best, they were also very very very important. (goals and saves vids here)

Dumont scored twice after being called out by his coach. That's a good way to get yourself out of the dog house.

On his first goal he basically had a wide open net. Everyone had slid over to the opposite side of the ice, completely ignoring Dumont, and allowing him to get the puck without any challengers. Nabby tried to slide back over, but it was too late and the puck smacked the back of the net to give the Preds the first goal on the game, and the 1-0 lead. Clowe totally missed his guy. I love you buddy, but don't forget about that guy back there you're supposed to be keeping an eye on.

Thankfully Staubitz decided it was finally his time to get off the schnide (drink!) and he put a puck in behind Pekka Rinne a mere 53 seconds later to tie the game at 1-1.

The Sharks were turning the puck over like it was a hot potato last night. The Preds had way too many good chances because of this. At times, you could tell the Sharks were just hanging on for dear life as the preds swarmed in their zone. If it wasn't for Nabby, it's quite likely the Sharks would have lost last night, and badly.

The crazy thing is, the game never seemed to get out of hand. The Preds would take the lead, and the Sharks would fight to tie it back up. The game was sloppy, but sloppy play form both teams let the Sharks stay in it. Well, that and the Sharks are the more skilled team. Even with sloppy play, they had a slight advantage. The Preds are skilled enough and fast enough to take advantage of your mistakes. When you give up that many opportunities to the other side, it's potentially a recipe for disaster.

At some point in the second, things disintegrated into a weird half brawl, half hug fest, right as JoePa lifted on past Rinne. We all sat their puzzled as the goal was totally ignored by everyone, and after sorting out the penalties, play resumed. No mention of the goal. None. I finally had to check @sharksingame on Twitter to find out it went in after the whistle. A whistle I never heard. That's the sort of thing I feel should get a short mention during coverage. Just, you know, so we aren't all sitting there wondering if we were the only people who saw the goal. It's a totally valid call, but man, confirm it.

Danny Boyle played in his first game back since injury and the flu took him out of the lineup. So happy to have him back.

Heatley, who scored twice last night, mentioned that the ice was bad inside the Sommet Center, which caused some of the oddities in game. I heard it snowed in Nashville yesterday, so I'm kind of surprised.

The Sharks play again on Monday @ 4pm in Toronto.

Today @ 5pm

CSN-CA & KFOX

By now, most if not all of you have heard the sad news about the death of Brendan Burke. Pension Plan Puppets has suggested that anyone wishing to make a donation to PFLAG in his honor.

Hello old friend. I see you've been having a good season out there. Got yourself a nice contract extension and everything. Things have been going pretty well for us too. Oh, I know, all those rumors about us and Chicago, but really, everything's fine. Have you heard? Marleau's got 38 goals! What? No, it's not a joke. I know no one talks about it but you know Patty. I mean, come on! yes, I know Ovi has 39, but they've been neck and neck all season. No, I don't think the C was the issue...dude, seriously? Everyone asks that. What? No, Oktoberfest was not the same without you. Saw Mark Smith downtown though. Yeah, he's still playing music. No, no, he's pretty good. Haha, yeah, I can't afford anything in that store either. Heard about that 10 round shoot out you guys had against the Coyotes. That was pretty epic, huh? Yeah, too bad about the loss. You'll get 'um next time. Huh? Oh yeah. Well, hey listen man, it's time to hit the ice for practice but I'll see you out there tonight, ok? Good talking to you.

Tonight @ 5pm

CSN-CA & KFOX

Sadly I'll be mailing this one in today. I have an amazingly bad headache that kept me up all night and then decided to leak into my neck for good measure. If, at some point, my frontal lobes burst out of my forehead, I won't be surprised.

I also spent what little sleep I did get thinking this was a game against Columbus. Rick Nash skating around in a Union uniform is just plain weird. He could skate quite effectively in all that wool though. I guess that's a good thing.

Whoo, never have I been so happy to have decided to stop watching a Sharks game before it got really bad.

I was a little torn about switching after the first because it'd been going so well and it looked like the game was going to be action packed until the very end. Then the second came and so did the Red Wing goals. Hmm, maybe Lost will be the right choice after all. I switched over before the second finished and proceeded to spend the next two hours picking my jaw up off the floor so I could read the gameday thread during commercials.

Yes, I am disappointing and occasionally angry when the Sharks lose. I let that go on for maybe 15 minutes at the most, and then I move on. Usually it's closer to 5. I'm not willing to waste my time being angry over something I'm watching for entertainment. I want the Sharks to win every game, but they can't. I'd really love for them to not imploded on the ice, but that's not going to stop happening either. Every team implodes a few times a season. Every team loses more than a few times a season. I am unwilling to let this fact effect my blood pressure in a negative way. It's just not worth it.

What usually gets me more than poor play is bad attitudes of the fans around me. Now in this case "around me" means "on the same message board I am on right now, " because I'm not at a game and therefore not being influenced by thousands of booing, possibly drunk, people. Since I was only checking stuff during commercials, I could z though the comments without ire when I saw those same old arguments surface once again. Oddly enough, usually during a loss to one of handful of teams who represent "statement games." And these games only seem to matter when the Sharks lose them. No one craps themselves when they win. Hell, no one even seems to remember when the Sharks win those games unless they absolutely trample the other team. (how you doin' Calgary?)

It irks me that no one's come up with any new arguments. I have seen pretty much the same thing written over and over for several years now, and all it tells me is that other people aren't watching the Sharks and only pay attention to them when the headline is bad. I also get a sense of this feeling that the team owes us. They owe us these wins, they owe us a trip to the final round. They owe us big.

If that's the case I don't even want to think what the Leafs owe Toronto at this point.

Do fans of other teams trot out similar old tired line when they lose? Like if the Flames go down, do they get similar treatment? The Canucks? Washington actually might, though I don't see it written about very often. What about the Sens? Anyone? or is it just that as a skilled Pacific Division team that maybe hasn't quite lived up to its potential is easy pickings? Does the fact that the Sharks themselves pushed the Cup= Success, everything else is failure part of their playoff past figure larger into the equation than it gets credit for? Did a marketing ploy to get fans really into the game and team push us all over the edge?

I consider it lucky to get to the playoffs as many years in a row as the Sharks have. I know they've only gotten to the Conference Finals once, but dude, they are have a record for worst season ever on the books not all that long ago. It's not like they never improved. And why are we talking about the post season in February? We're not even there yet! Don't count your sharklings before they hatch!

For the love of crap people, don't start trying to kill each other when the Sharks lose. The only people who need to feel the loss with that much zeal are the guys who were on the ice. The rest of us need to chill the eff out.

Tonight @ 7:30pm.

It's the last home game until after the break.

Consider yourself lucky if you have tickets.

The problem with this game is that it's a big bill match up of two bitter rivals that should be a hard, fast, gritty, glorious game and it's on at the same time as the Lost premiere. Ack! Thankfully, the first hour of the 3 hour (wha ?!) premier is a recap; I don't need to tune in for that. But I probably will end up missing the third, and that's a bummer. I'll likely be staying off Twitter during the game, because I'd like to watch Lost sans spoilers.

Namely our blue line is looking thinner than a wet cat. Working the Corners has the latest, but if you don't want to read it: Vlasic is out, Boyle is a game time decision, but very likely out. Murray appeared to be hurt last game, but he's still in. The Woostah shuttle has brought in Demers and Joslin.

Now that we can’t make trap jokes about the Wild, I feel lost and confused. This was the prefect game to bust out the Admiral, but now it's not. Oh former Sharks Assistant Coach, Todd Richards, why did you have to help the Wild learn how to do something other than bore the opposing team to death?

No longer will this meme grace the screens of various computers across the internet. I has a sad.

Thanks to mymclife for this one

The game is tonight @ 7:30 on CSN-Ca and KFOX. It's also one of the last home games before the Olympic break. If you want to head to the Tank, today's a good day to look for tickets.

Baseless Optimism.

This is my season motto.

It was last season's motto too, to be honest. With it comes several self imposed ruled; things I no longer allow myself to do.

I don't count my playoff chickens before they hatch. I don't let a few bad games dictate the future of the season. I don't leave games mad.While I may complain about the performance of certain players or the overall team, I still understand that a loss is a team loss and not all on one guy. (The "don't throw one dude under the bus rule" Unless, you know, he really deserves it. If you happen to score all the goals for the opposing team, for example, you might be due for some time under said bus.)

Aw...frak me...

So Mina and I have this habit of watching major political speeches and IMing comments back and forth. Sometimes they're witty, or they spark a short discussion on a point the speaker raised, but most of the time we're sitting there making fun of the audience and filling in the invisible speech bubbles above the heads of whoever happens to behind the President/ on screen at the moment. It doesn't matter what party, what event, this is what we do. Why? Because Sharks hockey isn't on.

It's true. Faced with staring at a vast expanse of nothingness (blank screen) or major political addresses, we'll take the major political address. It has nothing to do with us being nerds. No. Nothing at all. I mean, we couldn't be any less nerdy! We have a blog...crap.

Well, it's a sports blog, so that has to subtract some nerd points. Right?

What does all this have to do with the Sharks playing the Blackhawks?Well...uhm...you know, I'm not really sure.

Honestly, I'm terrified of these guys. They've beaten the Sharks like a well used punching bag. We do not speak of the three short handed goals against. We pretend that never happened. It was hugely embarrassing. I don't even think I watched all of that game. I don't remember. It was so bad I blacked it out. In fact, I've managed to forget every game against the Blackhawks this season. I have to. For my sanity. I mean, wtf do I write?!

*deep breath*

Ok. It's not all bad. The Sharks have won one game against the Blackhawks this season, albeit by the skin of their collective teeth. And the Sharks did do well against the Sabres, a fast and talented team. Not as fast as Chicago, but pretty fast. (although, was it just me, or was anyone else missing how that last game was the fastest of the season. I didn't feel that it was.) And the Sabres DO have CFR and Grier, formidable foes to be sure. They all seem to be able to keep their shirts on, unlike the Blackhawks. This may or may not be an important factor. Shirtless Joe's power of shirtlessness should be enough to nullify Kane's obvious lack of shirtless power, but whether or not that can nullify the Blackhawks scoring chances remains to be seen.

Dan Boyle may or may not be in. He got hurt, then he got the flu. What a combo.

On a more serious note, tonight is Haiti Relief Night at the Tank.I know a lot of us (myself included) have already donated what we could, but these people are in some seriously bad shape, and they need help. So, if you have is an extra buck or a handfull of change, and it won't break the bank, think about donating it. Donations will benefit UNICEF. (details about their programs and how much of your donations is going to Haitian relief.)

I got a request to do an Anze Kopitar inspired raccoon for the Kings. I believe Rudy Kelly over at BoC popularized this idea awhile back. (actually a lot further back than that, I just couldn't find the article I was looking for) It's so good, I have no idea why I didn't run with it. So, even though we don't face the Kings again this (regular) season, here it is.

Speaking of the Kings, I wish I could have watched them dismantle the Leafs last night, 5-3. Alas, I only have CSN and Versus, so I watched the Yotes and RedWings instead. For awhile, I didn't like the game that much. *yawn* oh look at that, the Wings are going to win. Sucks for Doan, those mistakes cost him..wait WHAT?! They TIED! They tied with 22 seconds left?! Awesome. You have won me over game, I will gladly watch your OT period. The on the ice reporter for Versus remarked that Doan may need a police escort to leave the arena safely after the thrilling 5-4 win. I'll just assume the only thing raining down on the ice during his interview were boos.