Sheng Peng
Here’s everything that San Jose Sharks GM Mike Grier said in his end-of-season availability.
In a 30-plus minute interview, Grier touched on a wide range of topics.
Some of the comments have been much-discussed, like what Grier said about the 2025 Draft, free agency, and offers that he got for the pick that became Macklin Celebrini.
But there’s other good stuff too, like Celebrini and Will Smith’s impact on the locker room, how the San Jose Sharks stood up for each other, his thoughts on Shakir Mukhamadullin’s injury, Zack Ostapchuk’s trajectory, and his full comments about the Nikolai Kovalenko situation.
It’s all transcribed here!
Grier, on whether there was growth this season:
Overall, the foundation started to be laid of what we want to be and the standard of work and compete and hard to play against. I think that was starting to get laid here this week, this year. The guys played hard. It’s definitely a different feeling for me watching the games—I think we had a chance to win a lot of games for a multitude of reasons. It was a step forward. It was disappointing to still finish the season where we did, but it’s a wins and losses league at the end of the day. To some degree, you are what your record says you are, and that’s the kind of frustrating and disappointing piece of it all, because I think the group played better—definitely more competitive and everything—but there’s still a long way to go.
Grier, on assessing Ryan Warsofsky’s first year as San Jose Sharks head coach:
I think Warso did a good job. I think he relates well to the players. He pushed the group, kept them on task and got a lot out of them, put some structure in and made some tweaks throughout the year that helped our group. I think the guys enjoyed playing for him.
Grier, on how Will Smith and Macklin Celebrini developed this year:
I think the plan worked pretty well for those guys. It’s a difficult league for young players, and I think both of them did well.
Mack had an unbelievable year for a kid who was 18 the whole season and had played the 1C role and went up against other teams’ top pairs and in defensive lines a lot. I think he handled it well, handled the media well and all the attention he got. On the ice, he drove our team—not only in games, but in practice, which is a lot for a young kid, but it says a lot about the mentality and the person and player he is for him to unknowingly take on that responsibility.
With Will, I’m happy with the year he had. I think coming into the season, we knew there’d be a lot of ups and downs and some growing pains, and he handled it well. As you guys could probably see, as the year went on, he got a little bit more comfortable with things, he started [making] more plays and figured out things he could and couldn’t do, just getting used to the pace and how the game is played.
We’re really happy with both of them. I think there aren’t many kids who were asked or being relied upon to produce a lot for their teams at that age, and I think they both did a really good job of doing that.
Grier, on how has the Celebrini-Smith dynamic helped the team:
I think it’s been good for them to have someone to go through this with.
For us, I think their bond is going to carry this group. Their excitement to be at the rink and to be in the NHL and to play hockey together and share this experience, their energy was a little bit infectious to the whole group. When you go through a tough season like this, having guys come to the rink and be excited to be at the rink is really helpful, and I think those guys were definitely happy to be starting to live their dream and doing it together.
For us, to have those two pillars to start building with, it’s exciting.
Grier, on what he plans to prioritize this off-season:
I think it’s all somewhat tied together, but we definitely have to be better defensively—keep pucks out of our net, cut down on the high-danger chances, and be able to get out of our end a little quicker and not let things get out of hand and so on. It’s all kind of tied together.
As the playoffs get started here, when you watch Four Nations, you’re not going to win too many, too many games when it really matters 7-5, and things like that. You got to be tighter and better defensively, and I think that’s the next step for our group, to cut the goals against.
There’s a lot of things that will go into it, I’m sure—getting another year in the system will help, personnel will help—if there’s personnel changes, that’ll help. Internal growth from our players that are coming back, getting better and working on things that they’ve been asked to work on. The coaches are obviously going through the film and watching the trends in the league and seeing what the successful teams are doing, so I’m sure there’ll be some system tweaks and things like that.
There’ll be a lot that goes into it, and some maturing from our group. Sometimes you gotta realize that it’s okay to win a game 2-1 or 3-2, and that the important thing is keeping the puck out of your net.
Grier, on how the young defense corps can progress:
If I start with [Luca Cagnoni and Jack Thompson] for them, I think it was a good experience just to see what the NHL was like, and what it’s like to defend these players at this level. I think they earned their opportunities up here. I think Cags had a really great year for being a rookie in the American League, and it was good for him to get a taste of defending guys up here. Even offensively, seeing what you can get away with lanes that are probably available in the American League that aren’t available up here. It’s really valuable experience for those two.
[Shakir Mukhamadullin and Henry Thrun], those guys, it’s important to get reps—the more reps you get, the better you get at everything. Their task to play against other teams’ top players a lot, I think they held their own. It’s something that they can take home and build on and be confident that they were able to do it—especially since this was Shak’s first real taste of it, and he was even more so playing on his off-side quite a bit, so I think it was really, really good experience for him. I think his last probably 4 or 5 games were probably [his] best hockey.
They should feel good about it, but also, I think they realized how hard it is. It’s not an easy position for a young player, but we’re excited about them, and I think they should be excited about what’s happening.
Grier, on how players respond and stand up for each other, specifically the Mukhamadullin injury:
Overall, I’m pretty happy with how guys stuck up for each other and had each other’s back.
Would we have liked maybe a little bit of a different response in that situation? Sure, but at the same time it was, for me, it was an overreaction from [Frank Vatrano], a little bit. I think the hit probably looked worse than it actually was.
Some of it’s a little bit on Shak, too, learning the league—you have to always be ready to protect yourself, and that doesn’t mean fighting or anything of that, but you gotta have your head on a swivel and be ready, so I think it was a little bit of a learning lesson for him.
Overall, I think I’m pleased with the steps that we have taken being there for each other on the ice.
Grier, on Will Smith’s future position being center:
I mean, we drafted Will as a center, he’s been a center his whole life. I think starting next year, we’ll probably get him back in there and see how it goes.
It never hurts. That kind of used to be a little bit of the old way when centers would come in the league as wings and learn their trade like that. Tomas Hertl did it here—started on the wing and went back to the middle—and I think Will is more than capable of being a really good center in this league, and a point-producing center and an impactful center, so we’re excited for that.
I think it was good for him to know that he can play on the wing, and if there’s situations that come up where we feel like we want to move him to the wing for whatever reason, the fact that he’ll know that he can do it will be important to him.
Grier, on if Smith will start next season at center:
I think we’ll probably put him back in the middle like when we drafted him. That’s what we envisioned, and that’s what he’s been his whole life. He’s got all the attributes to be a good center in this league.
Grier, on helping Celebrini handle the losing:
Well, I mean, players like him that are driven and wired the way they are, he’s always going to be not happy with losing. Some of that comes with maturity and getting older—he’s still an 18-year-old kid, so I’m sure he’s going to be frustrated and upset at times. A lot of that is just going to come with growth. As a team gets better, hopefully when he gets older, he’ll be able to handle that stuff. You can’t really take that competitive fire and drive out of guys like that, it’s just how they’re wired. When we don’t win, he’s going to be upset, and that’s kind of the way it should be.
Grier, on the Nikolai Kovalenko situation:
Had a good meeting with him yesterday.
Kovy, I think he’s a talented player, as you guys can see. He can make plays and sees the ice well. It was an adjustment for him to play in the NHL in North America over here, it’s a different type of hockey, and also getting traded on top of that.
I think probably a little bit is getting made out of this more than it should be.
Warso has been great with our group, I don’t think he handled Kovy any differently than he handled anyone else in this room. He treats everyone fairly, and he’s got an expectation of what he wants from players as far as compete and work and managing the puck, and how we’re going to play, and things that he wants. When you look at Kovy, I think, at times, it was hard for him to meet some of the things that were asked of him, and that’s fine.
It’s no different than Will or Henry Thrun coming out of the lineup or Shak coming out of the lineup. Young players come in this league, and it’s a difficult league, and you’re asked to do things. I just think with him, he’s a player who has skills to make a play, and I think he’s finding out that there’s a time and place for all that, as far as when to make a play. He can make a play, as you guys saw, but there’s also times we got to manage the puck and things like that.
When everyone comes to this league, dating back forever, [whatever league you’re from], you’re always one of the best players, right? Then when you get to the NHL, you’re like, “Well, there’s a lot of guys better and more skilled than me, so I better learn the other things—the little things that impact the game and keep me in the lineup and things the coaches want to do.” It’s a very select few guys who want to come in the league, and they go right to the top.
For young guys, not just Kovy, you have to figure out what else you can do to help your team win and what the coaches want from you. The guys that figure that out quickly are the guys that kind of find their legs and stay in the league.
Grier, on if he would like Kovalenko back:
I mean, I can’t speak for him. I’m sure he might have opportunities to go back home and play back home or be comfortable back home. I’m not sure what his thoughts are that way.
From us, he was good. I think he’s a talented kid, we just have to sort out how much he’s willing to buy into what we want to do and how we want to do things here and go from there.
There’s going to be an evaluation period with that, and I think he’s got to be honest with himself, and talk to his agent and his circle about what he wants and what he’s willing to do. As of right now, we’ll plan on him being here next year.
Grier, on if the Mackenzie Blackwood trade is disappointing if Kovalenko doesn’t work out:
I wouldn’t call it disappointing. We were excited about the player, but sometimes things don’t work out, it’s kind of part of the business. It’s not a closed door or closed chapter, his story hasn’t been written, so we’ll see where it goes.
Grier, on Alexandar Georgiev’s departure and the future of goaltending in San Jose:
Georgie—I think he had a flight yesterday, so he couldn’t really stick around too long for a meeting, so we ended up meeting earlier. I let him know we’d probably be going in a different direction there.
I think [Yaroslav Askarov] will get a chance for sure to be one of the two goalies up here. Whether he’s the 1 or the 1B is going to be up to him—how he performs, how he plays, how he trains in the summer and prepares to come in here. We’re not going to just hand him the role and say “You’re playing 60 games next year,” he’s going to get the ice time that he earns and deserves.
We’ll find another goalie to come in here and tandem with him and push him. He’s not Connor Hellebuyck where we’re going to go out there and just say, “I need a [back-up] to give me 20 games,” right? We need someone who’s gonna challenge Asky, push him, and then even possibly be the guy if Asky doesn’t perform well.
I think it’s important for us to have competition—I think I’ve talked about that from day one, the importance of competition on the roster and in goal, it’s no different.
Grier, on looking for more of a veteran goalie or personality fit to complement Askarov:
I mean, I don’t think it would be ideal to have two young and inexperienced guys in the net. There’s all different levels of veterans—there might be guys who have played three or four years, or then there’s the guys that have been in the league for 10 years. We’ll look at all those guys.
Our goalie group and myself and the staff, we’re kind of assessing right now, personality wise, of what we think would work best with Asky.
Grier, on how he thinks the San Jose Sharks development team is doing:
I think our development group’s been great, really.
Todd Marchant, leading it, he’s been really diligent. We’re fortunate enough to have a lot of NHL experience helping these guys—Tommy Wingels, Luca Sbisa, [Niklas Sundstrom] over in Europe with their guys, and then having reached Jumbo and Patty around here. We’re really happy with the job they’ve done developing not only the guys that are here with the Cuda and the Sharks, but the guys in college and USHL and junior—our scout [Ales Vladyka] in Czechia has done a great job getting videos to put together, and our staff has done a really good job identifying things they want these guys to work on and getting, you know NHL clips, and sending it to these guys and staying on top of them.
The amount of travel our development guys do is crazy, really. They’re on the road non-stop seeing our guys, meeting with them, talking to them, on the phone with them, doing Zoom calls and everything. I am extremely, extremely happy with the development group.
Grier, on RFAs Klim Kostin and Georgi Romanov:
It’s kind of too early to give definitive answers on that stuff. Yesterday was the players, today, we’ll be meeting with the coaches, then staff. It’ll be next week where we really start to dig into this stuff on the roster and really evaluate each and every player. It’s probably a little too early to give anything definitive on anyone, really.
Grier, on UFA Jan Rutta:
Rutts, he’s been pretty steady for us here for two years. I think he’s done a good job helping our young guys out, being a little bit of a stabilizer, especially on the PK. As I told him, he’s on the list with some other guys where it’s a possibility we bring them back, but we gotta look to do what we think is best, and make tweaks to the roster and try and get better where we can. We’ll just kind of see where it goes.
Grier, on assessing Zack Ostapchuk post-trade:
I thought Chucky—maybe his last three games—I thought he played well for a kid.
To get traded at the Deadline, whether you want to admit it or not, I think you can almost look back the other way—when [Fabian Zetterlund] came in, it was a real struggle for Zetts when he came here, and then the next year, he kind of took off. I think Chucky was getting more and more comfortable as he went on.
We still feel good about him as a player, as a kid. I think he fits in the room, I think you can see the attributes that he has with his size and his skating and his physicality, so he’s right on track, with what we think he can be, and he can get there. We’re not going to put too much pressure on the kid, we’re going to let him kind of grow at his own pace. A lot of those times with those players in those roles, it’s not something that’s overnight, it takes a little bit of time with him, and we’ll give it to him.
Grier, on his free agency plans:
We’ll be smart, we’ll be active, and we’ll see what’s out there. I think I’ve always been telling you guys, I’m not going to go crazy out there and sign four or five guys and throw out a bunch of term, but we’ll definitely be targeted with the players we’re going after, kind of like we were last summer.
Grier, on going past five years of contract term:
I mean, I guess there’s a possibility of it. I think it’s still not something I’m excited to do—to hand out, you know, seven or eight-year deals or anything like that. I’d still like to keep it more in the short to mid-term range, if possible.
Grier, on using all his picks as tools in a trade:
It just gives us some ammo to be involved in some things.
If players become available or, like you said, if it’s to try and move up or whatever it may be.
But it’s a pretty valuable thing, and if we use it to draft a player, then it’s someone we’ll be excited about to kind of add to our cupboard of young players.
Grier, on Warsofsky’s staff and if he anticipates them returning:
I thought they did a good job.
I think [Doug Houda] was a good veteran presence for us back there. He’s been in the league a long time, so I think he’s got a little bit of an old-school way around him, which I think was good for our group.
I think [Jeff Ulmer] took on some of the faceoffs and skill stuff, pre and post-practice. I think the guys enjoyed that, and he’s got a good personality, so I know he helped a lot of those guys, especially the guys who were getting scratched a lot mentally, kind of get through things.
And [Brian Wiseman], offensively, thinks the game well. I think he’s bonded with our group.
We’re still gonna have to go through with the evaluations for everything. But you know, overall, I would probably anticipate the whole staff came back.
We don’t need to talk about [Thomas Speer, there’s too much good stuff out there about him] (laughs).
Grier, on the Sharks’ odds in the upcoming Draft Lottery:
You’re kind of fortunate enough to, last year, be able to pick someone like Mack. Every draft’s different.
When you look at the top of the Draft, our top-five is probably different than probably 80 percent of the league’s top-five. Our scouts have done a good job seeing all these kids. There’s a lot of talent. I think we feel really good about the players, wherever we end up, where the ping pong balls go. I think we’re going to get another really good player that’s going to really help our group.
At the top, after [Matthew] Schaefer, it’s probably more forward heavy, I would say.
Grier, on entertaining trade offers for the No. 1 pick:
I mean, I’m not gonna say no, someone wants to make a really good offer of established young players.
It’s not something I’m gonna close the door on. Last year, I probably shut the door on everything. But you never know. There’s a Ricky Williams-Herschel Walker type offer up. We’ll listen.
Grier, on if there were any crazy offers for the pick that became Celebrini:
I got some good ones, probably some that were probably pretty comparable to [Walker-Williams]. As crazy as a couple of them were, we didn’t really think about it for more than 30 seconds.
Grier, on prioritizing the improvement of the defensive corps:
It goes back to what we talked about earlier.
It’s gonna start with us keeping the puck out of our net a little bit more. And that kind of ties in with the breakouts, getting out of our end a little bit cleaner. Improving the back-end is definitely something we’re [looking at].
Special thanks to Maddie Dutra for her help transcribing