The first step to our mock draft is to establish the list of players that will be available for the Las Vegas franchise to draft. To do this, we decided to have a blogger from each team represent their own franchise and select the players that will be protected from the Mock Expansion Draft available player pool. To see the rules which were followed to protect players, hit this link.

Next up, we have the San Jose Sharks. The Sharks are being represented by Jon Wold from FearTheFin.com.

Protected Players

Analysis from FearTheFin.com:

Among the forwards, I had to keep Marleau and Thornton. Yeah, they’ll be old, but they might have no movement clauses to keep them in SJ. But also because it would break my heart to see them anywhere else. I’ve been so impressed with Joonas Donskoi this year, I had to protect him. So, I had to choose one of Chris Tierney, Matt Nieto and Melker Karlsson. I went with Tierney because the organization loves having as many centers as possible.

On defense, early second rounder Jeremy Roy had to be kept, and by 2017, Brenden Dillon’s contract is likely to look very good. Although I might be in the minority of Sharks fans to think that of Dillon at the moment. That meant risking first rounder Mirco Mueller, who I’m not sold on developing beyond a bottom pairing guy.

The biggest names left out are Joel Ward and Paul Martin. I love both of them and think they were extremely underrated signings this past offseason. But by 2017, their contracts won’t be as palatable as they are now.

The entire list of unprotected players that will be available for Team Lane and Team Pothier to select from can be found here.

To see more team explanations just like this one, check out The Sin Bin Mock Expansion Draft Landing Page.

Special thanks again to Jon Wold from FearTheFin.com. Be sure to follow @FearTheFin and @JonathanWold on Twitter, and heck, throw us (@SinBinVegas) a follow too while you’re at it.