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after a solid 15 months of procrastination hard work and many, many requests, the sharks discord is proud to present: the san jose sharks primer!

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no panic :)

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✨ 🥅

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it’s sad martin jones’ time as a shark ends like this after everything but i rly hope he gets a change of scenery and finds his game again 🥺

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‘This is who I am’: Predators prospect Luke Prokop comes out by Pierre LeBrun, 19 July 2021

Luke Prokop was driving his car, so he couldn’t totally freak out.

But man, what he was feeling at the moment.

The 2020 third-round draft pick of the Nashville Predators was on a call with the NHL club’s key front office people including GM David Poile.

Their message to Prokop? They were all proud of him. They had his back. He didn’t have to worry about anything.

“When I think about the feeling of being free, that was the closest I think I’ve been to it so far,” Prokop, 19, said.

“I turned up the music as loud as I could. I was wearing sunglasses, I started to cry, tears of joy, I didn’t want anyone to see me crying while I was driving. But I was blasting the tunes and slamming on my steering wheel. It was amazing.’’

No doubt Prokop had wondered for nearly a year how that call with the Predators would go ever since they drafted him 73rd last fall.

“I can’t thank them enough for supporting me,’’ Prokop said.

He had just taken his next important step in a process that began in March 2020.

Telling people in his own world that he’s gay.

Now, with this interview in The Athletic, he is ready to tell the entire world.

“Very brave young man,’’ Poile said. “It took a lot of courage. I’m proud that he did that. It’s got to be exciting for him to be taking this step. This is a big story and hopefully it helps and encourages others in similar situations. It’s a big deal.’’

There has never been an openly gay active player in the NHL. Amazingly, this 6-foot-5, 221-pound defenceman is coming out before his first pro camp.

And yes, part of the reason Prokop is coming out is to help others. But first and foremost, it was to lift a 100-pound anvil off his back.

Just being able to tell people around him over the past year has been freeing.

“It’s been very special, talking to my friends, my family, my coaches, my agents,’’ Prokop said. “And them being very supportive, me coming out and being OK with who I was. I think it’s been translating a lot into my summer and my summer training. I’ve noticed myself being a lot more confident on the ice.

“Being able to truly be who I am. This is the best I’ve ever felt in the summer and I think a large part of that is due to this process of me coming out.’’

Why now?

Prokop doesn’t want to wonder anymore.

“I don’t want to have to walk into the gym or to the arena or just to practice, and keep thinking, ‘Who knows? Who doesn’t?’ This is who I am,” Prokop said.

“I don’t think it’s going to be a big topic of conversation, that’s not what I want it to be. It’s just, ‘Hey, here’s who I am.’ It gets it off my chest. So I don’t have to worry and wonder about other people.”

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Anyways so this one time at a parade I saw a man with the cleanest mullet I’ve ever seen

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ALEXANDER ROMANOV: 2018 every player on the montreal canadiens [15/28]

drafted 38th overall by the habs in 2018; the pick used to select him was acquired in the trade for phillip danault

hockey is in his blood; his maternal grandfather zinetula bilyaletdinov coached the russian national ice hockey team from 2011 to 2014 and his father, stanislav romanov, is also a former khl player

he actually went to the draft, even though he wasn’t sure if he’d be drafted, because at least he’d be able to buy sneakers at the mall

he played for cska moscow in the khl before coming to north america

had a pretty ridiculous world juniors playing for russia (bronze 2019, silver 2020)

he got married REALLY young and is a total wife guy, he and his wife sofiya are very cute together (seriously he’s very sweet about her in interviews)

he has a panda shirt and matching shorts that he wears mostly because she likes it

he is pretty much the epitome of happy to be here, he’s always smiling, always the first one on the ice at practice and often the last one off the ice, and always in the gym

best quality: his wiggles (seriously one of his pregame rituals is bouncing up and down in the tunnel)

he has intricate rituals with eddy and kk, but would only give nick a fistbump

his first career fight was against josh noriss and he forgot to take his gloves off and then didn’t realize he was bleeding

he’s extremely quotable and says things like “we’re playing like a team; we’re playing like a family,” and “you have to be smart, you have to be fast, and just play with heart. that’s it; that’s all you need for the nhl” and “luck is coming!”

lost an edge and had to be lifted like a kitten over the boards by mama cat shea weber

he owns approximately two hoodies

he is super fun at practice

he hits like a truck and they are always clean, solid hits

he is a hugely, highly touted prospect (literally the hype about him was unreal) and he played every game in the regular season, so when he was benched during the playoffs, it was to the great displeasure of the fanbase. he was a very good sport about it and his joy at being put back into the lineup was literally palpable

to be fair, his numbers were not great. however, neither were the numbers of the guys who replaced him

the fact that he scored a goal after getting back into the lineup was just the cherry on top

i think he’s going to be a very solid player for the team for a long time; it’s easy to forget, given the minutes and responsibility that he had during the season, how young he still is and that defensemen take longer to mature than forwards

he has a very strong sense of his own responsibility and what he wants to provide to the team

when asked what rule he would change from the nhl he said “everything’s good! :))))”

under the cut please enjoy disney princess alexander romanov befriending a squirrel

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BRETT KULAK: 2018 every player on the montreal canadiens [14/28]

drafted 105th overall by the calgary flames in 2012

he started his pro career in the ECHL and worked his way up

he was traded to the habs in 2018, and assigned to the laval rocket. however, he was recalled due to an injury to noah juulsen and then, when shea weber came off of injured reserve, the habs put alzner on waivers rather than him

he signed a three year contract extension

his nickname is kuly

he used to wear number 17, but when the habs signed ilya kovalchuk, kuly gave him his number in exchange for an engraved rolex. now he wears 77

he’s honestly one of our few defensemen who can skate the puck out of the zone, so the fact that he’s frequently out of the lineup is both puzzling and kind of sucks

he’s a good sport about it and is always just happy to get whatever minutes he can get :(

the bottom gif is kuly losing a fight and inadvertently starting a line brawl

i have horrible face blindness when it comes to him for some reason i can NEVER recognize him

this might also be because he’s in literally. none. of the habs social media videos.

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JESPERI KOTKANIEMI: 2018 every player on the montreal canadiens [13/28]

drafted 3rd overall by the habs in 2018

prior to being drafted, he was playing for his hometown liiga team, porin ässät

his father mikael is a hockey coach

his older brother kasperi also plays hockey (he is a goalie which is interesting because usually the younger brothers get forced to play goal, he plays for karhu ht which is the third tier finnish league team in pori)

jesperi’s nicknames include jepu (at home), kk (by habs fans), moomie (because he looks like a moomin), and bobs (by victor mete)

he’s won gold and silver two years in a row with the finnish team in world juniors

as a child kk had a poster of joel armia in his bedroom (they are now very good friends)

kk made the team right out of his first dev camp, and had a pretty solid rookie year

he was the first person born in 2000 to play in one of the “big four” leagues in north america

kk is very close with victor mete, who was claimed off of waivers by ottawa this year. the two of them called each other bobs and had their own little slang language and were basically inseparable

he also has a really cute/fun friendship with nick, the two of them can be seen chatting at practice all the time/rough housing/etc

he had a rough sophomore season plagued by injury and send-downs, and kind of a rough third season as well, with a rotating cast of wingers and some scoring slumps/defensive issues

at his best, kk is an incredibly fun player to watch and great at creative passes

ADDITIONALLY, he has been amazing in both sets of playoffs (2020 bubble and 2021 cup run, despite being benched a few games) including scoring the ot game winner to force a game seven against the leafs

he has a very goofy sense of humor and has been responsible for some of my favorite quotes ever from an nhl player (see also: having a personality as a hockey player without being an asshole)

he has been in one career fight. he fought robert hägg and kicked his ass. shea weber called him killer afterwards lmao

kk is a somewhat divisive player. some montreal fans are convinced he’s going to be the 1c and put down every other center on the team in favor of him, others are convinced he’s a bust because he hasn’t scored 80 points in a season yet (tbh this is MOST habs fans on twitter in general but like……… they’re especially nuts about kk)

some of his most ardent supporters are absolutely delusional and i have never seen anything like it before it’s like they don’t think about the team at all beyond what kk is doing or can provide to it or how he’s being treated or deployed to the point of writing overwrought fanfic about him (i’m not naming names but if you know you know)

sometimes brendan gallagher rubs his head for good luck during shootouts

if he could change one rule in the nhl he would get rid of the coach’s challenge penalty

he misses his mom’s cooking because she’s a hell of a chef

he’s learned some french from the equipment guys and trainers

his “wow, i made it to the nhl” moment was taking a faceoff against crosby in his second game (he lost the faceoff)

he has a call of duty squad with lehky and gally (gally is not very good and is the most expensive guy in their squad)

he’s friends with both joel armia and joel armia’s dog

he and nick have spoken at length about their future plans for the habs and how they want to win a cup together

his stick says “suutu jo! vitu kusipää” (get mad you fucking asshole)

here is a really interesting article by jack han about how kk hasn’t fully reached his potential, and specifically needs to work on shouldering speed to evolve

another interesting article about jason paul talking about kk’s stats, performance, and whether nick deserves the 1c/2c spot over him

because it’s large, below the cut is an anecdote about kk and nick from one of arpon’s articles that i love a lot and an example of kk’s particular brand of humor

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JOEL ARMIA: 2018 every player on the montreal canadiens [12/28]

selected 16th  overall by the buffalo sabres in 2011

before coming over to north america, he played for his hometown team in the liiga, porin ässät

they won the league championship in 2012-13; in a twist of fate, one of the assistant coaches was mikael kotkaniemi (mikael’s son jesperi is, coincidentally, a big joel armia fan)

on that note, army has been described by kk as “a hometown hero with those blond curls”

he owns a very cute puppy named otso; otso is a lagotto, a breed used in italy for hunting truffles, he’s very smart and energetic and needs to be kept busy with puzzles

anyway he started out playing with the sabres’ ahl affiliate, got recalled, then got traded to the jets in 2015

he was traded to the habs in 2018 with steve mason, a seventh round 2019 pick, and a fourth round 2020 pick for simon bourque; he signed a one year extension

he is great friends with kk; they live in the same apartment building, carpool to practices, and army’s girlfriend has to tell them to cut it out sometimes

army has had trouble with consistency and injuries; he often goes games without notable offense and then will have a multi goal game where you’re like “HOLY SHIT WTF WAS THAT”

even when he’s not scoring, he’s frickin’ amazing defensively and on the penalty kill

he is second to none for puck possession on the team and it is a real treat to watch like three players attempt to get the puck from him and just bounce off of his ass

it was really fun watching him on a line with nick and cole; he would get the puck for them and they would just go

in the words of one teammate he is “an absolute horse”

he was a runner-up vote in player polls for best backhand, and he also has a wicked wrister (voted best wrist shot by his teammates in 2019)

army doing army things:

voted runner up by his teammates as the best shot (after jeff petry): “he has such a long reach that he can pull it in and release it from just about anywhere. it’s just a huge window where he can release it and it’s so long and quick and silent that it just shoots up.”

he’s come up clutch in the playoffs the last two years but again, his inconsistency means his contract situation is uncertain right now. i truly hope we can keep him, i think what he provides the team is not easily replaced

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CAYDEN PRIMEAU: 2017 every player on the montreal canadiens [11/28]

drafted in the seventh round, 199th overall, by the habs in 2017

he’s the son of former flyer keith primeau and spent most of his childhood in voorhees (a local boy! :)

he is a big boy. 6′ 3″ 200 lbs.

his nickname is either prime or preems depending on who you’re talking to or which social media person is running the account that day

he has a 199 painted on his helmet to remind himself where he came from and how grateful he is to be here and how much more work he still has to do

he had a stellar first two seasons in college; although his team didn’t win championships, they made it into the postseason partially on his back, and he won all kinds of awards (including tournament mvp and the mike richter)

he went pro in 2019-20 and has mostly spent that time in laval. he played two games for the habs in 2019 (lost his first, won his second) and four games in 2020 (won one, lost two, lost one in overtime)

in laval, he wears 31 (for carey?) and on the habs he wears 30. in a nice little twist, when carey played a game for laval, he wore 30 while cayden kept 31.

he’s been very solid in laval with michael mcniven as his tandem partner, but the few times he’s played in the show it’s clear he’s not like 100% ready for it just yet

he had a REALLY rough game against the leafs this year to the point where he got pulled and was like. having a moment in the tunnel where he was staring at the wall and didn’t want to go to the room yet. a bunch of the skaters went to comfort him and so did jake allen. it was really something (sad for preems, sweet that the rest of the team tried to comfort him). the team is very close and it’s easy to forget he’s still only 21

his overall personal vibe is like aggressively chill and he has the whole goalie “i only focus on the moment” thing going for him

he actually admits to reading books, which i think is fairly notable for a hockey player

he tries to eat at least one smoothie a day (?) 

joël bouchard on cayden, after his first pro season: “when the talent and attitude are there, you probably have a very good player on your hands. but… 1999! it’s always a long term project when it comes to goaltenders. he’s just 20. he’s very young. our job is to surround him, let him perform, but also fix things when they’re not going well.”

would not let nick suzuki “just score” on him during shootout practice

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JONATHAN DROUIN: 2016 every player on the montreal canadiens [10/28]

drafted 3rd overall by the tampa bay lightning in 2014

he is from sainte-agathe-des-monts, which is a picturesque summer tourist/cottage destination

he also played tennis when he was younger

in the 2013 qmjhl/chl playoffs, he and nathan mackinnon, playing under dominique ducharme for the halifax mooseheads, won the president’s cup and the 2013 memorial cup

somewhat infamously, one of his teammates kissed him right on the mouth during the celly

things in tampa did not go smoothly and there was some ~controversy over his attitude and feelings he should have cracked the lineup sooner

he was injured in the 2014-15 training camp and again bounced up and down from the nhl to the ahl

in january 2016, he was suspended without pay for failing to report for a crunch game against the marlies. according to drouin’s camp, a trade was imminent and he didn’t want to get hurt playing for an ahl team right before that; he eventually did report for duty

in march 2016, he was traded to the habs for mikhail sergachev, who’d only played a few games for the habs at that point, and a conditional 2018 pick

he immediately signed a six year extension

although he matched his career high point totals in his second season, he was always kind of a controversial player for the habs. they tried to play him at center, and he just didn’t work out there. there was always the belief that he “wasn’t trying” or took games off.

in 2019, he suffered a wrist injury (a torn tendon) and unfortunately, his shot was never quite the same / it never fully healed.

he was great in the 2019-20 playoffs with nick and army; he was stellar to start the 2020-21 season playing with nick and josh anderson

he has twice forgotten to take his skate guards off and fallen over. once he accidentally got some kind of irritating cream down his pants and started just. taking them off on the bench.

please enjoy this very cute video of him interviewing fans and like no one recognizes him which is also very bittersweet because one of them tells him not to take montreal too seriously

nicolas deslauriers would ABSOLUTELY NOT trust jo to babysit his kids for an evening (jo WOULD let nic pick his first tattoo… interesting) (nic deslauriers also believes that while jo is capable of pulling off a man bun, he should not – the clear divide here between the hipsters and the non-hipsters in the quebecois contingent)

begrudgingly said phil danault would have better hair in 30 years but that he was going to watch the tape then to compare

phil would not let jo take his math exam for him

jo: what does your mom think of me? phil: no. put it back

picked shea weber as the smartest guy on the team and ben chiarot as the best looking guy on the team

possibly because of the nagging wrist injury, he had a hard time shooting, it seemed. although he was still getting some assists, his play definitely suffered

he’s a really talented player regardless, and was one of the best and most effective habs at skating the puck through the neutral zone.

he used to bag skate HIMSELF when he felt that he wasn’t playing well

media and fans online were pretty hard on and toxic towards him (phil danault spoke at length about how hard it is and how much pressure there is as a quebecer playing for the habs). towards the end of april 2021, he took an indefinite leave of absence for personal reasons and was placed on ltir. he did not return to the team during the cup run. it was truly sad what happened; you can tell how close the team is and losing him that way definitely hurt them and i’m sure that for him to do that, whatever was going on was truly unbearable. it was pretty brave of him to leave and could not have been an easy decision.

there is a lot of speculation that he will be traded in the offseason or will somehow end up in seattle. a change of scenery and to get away from the mtl hockey market/media might not be the worst thing for him.

wherever he is, and whether or not he chooses to play hockey again, i hope he’s happy and doing well.

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If there's one thing hockey should adapt from football/soccer it's how in football when the defense fucks up the goalkeeper straight up murders them. Like catch them screaming at their terrible team for leaving them out to dry.

I just think hockey would be more fun if goalies yelled at their team to fucking do better.

We all know you know your team is full of useless twats, why not yell at them about it?

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SHEA WEBER: 2016 every player on the montreal canadiens [9/28]

drafted 49th overall by the nashville predators in 2003

played both forward and defense in peewee hockey but his father convinced him to switch to defense because he thought he’d have a better shot at a pro career

has often finished high in norris voting, but never won

he was a hugely important player with the predators and was named their captain in 2010

in the 2012 offseason, the preds couldn’t take him to arbitration again and the flyers went into chaos mode and offer sheeted him with “a front-loaded $110 million, 14-year offer sheet ($68 million of it as a signing bonus)” which he signed and which was then matched. it’s literally not even a legal contract anymore (like that kind of contract can’t be made again)

married his high school sweetheart, bailey, in 2013

won olympic gold with canada twice

he was traded to the habs in 2016, in exchange for pk subban. it was a very controversial trade at the time.

he was named the captain of the canadiens in 2018, and has been the captain ever since. a lot has been written about his “aura” and his leadership, but especially after this year and this cup run, i think it’s fairly clear to see how important he is to the team and how much the guys truly look up to him and care about him, and how he’s set a culture of accountability and hard work in place.

he plays through injuries waaaay more than he should

he is known for his incredibly hard slapshot (and even if he isn’t as useful doing it on the powerplay anymore, rip) he can shoot as hard as 106.5 mph and there are entire compilations of guys blocking weber shots and hobbling off the ice (joel eriksson ek blocked three in one shift and had to leave the game)

he’s very, very taciturn in interviews and the media doesn’t get a lot out of him. that’s why it was especially notable when he didn’t let carey take responsibility for the losses early in the series against tampa

pours pickle juice on his legs before games because it gets the boys going 🤢

agreed with carey that if they got in a snowball fight it would be a draw and they would both have black eyes

he likes to organize team meals as a way to foster good relationships

he is also one of the first players to welcome a rookie or new player

he will also fight to protect the rookies, even if he doesn’t win. a notable moment was immediately attacking mikhail sergachev for a bad hit on nick in nick’s rookie year

everyone on the team knows about the shea weber death stare and does their best to avoid it

has played over 1,000 games and is pretty much considered “the dad of the room” no matter what team he’s on

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the san jose sharks of the national hockey league. click for higher resolution. imgsrc.

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