San Jose Sharks Get Jump on Playoffs, Start Choking Now

The Sharks are widely recognized as the most talented team in the league, and their regular season record over the past three seasons (best in the league) reflects it.

The Sharks are also widely recognized as the biggest chokers once the playoffs start. We can debate whether they should be labeled the biggest, but it is indisputable they have choked, something I have outlined definitively before.

It has come (in order) from a lack of toughness, resilience, fire, and adjustment. On three of those occasions, they have lost to a lower seed.

They are still four weeks from the playoffs and they are exhibiting all four problems already. To a man, the analysts, players, and coaches are upset with the effort and the focus, and it has yielded the following results:

1. Being scored on first in 13 of the last 14 games.
2. A 4-7-1 record in the last 12 games despite seven of those teams being outside the playoff picture at the time of the game. During this stretch, they have scored just 30 goals (plus one credited in a shootout) while giving up 42.
3. In the nine games since the Olympic break, the Sharks have had 61 fewer blocked shots (160-99) than their opponents—one of the truest barometers of effort—and have been beaten in this statistic in eight straight games.
4. The Sharks have now also been outhit in five consecutive games.

Perhaps the most troubling thing to me is the lesson learned by the Sharks four best players in the Olympics. Canada performed poorly in half of its games and still won the gold, and the four gold medalists may think they can turn it on when necessary, something that does not work when the opposing talent is a little closer to your level than anyone's was to Canada's.

Hopefully, Sweden's Douglas Murray can carry a lesson about overlooking an opponent and Joe Pavelski can provide a lesson on how working hard allows a team to play above its head. Or the team could remember all the previous years it was out-worked in May.

In last year's State of the Sharks (you can see me about 42 minutes in questioning Joe Thornton on his lack of emotion in the playoffs), General Manager Doug Wilson commented on wanting to have talent with a "blue-collar work ethic." He clearly understands the need for increasing the effort level to match the talent on the team.

There were players added to meet that goal. Scott Nichol and Manny Malhotra are spark plugs, and more of the younger players are in the lineup to add energy this season compared to last. Yet the results are not there.

In an article I wrote on the matter, players, coaches, and analysts all spoke of the problem. In another , it seemed to be the team's top priority, and they supposedly had a meeting.

I saw an improvement in their effort against Dallas and Vancouver, but key turnovers and costly lapses in defensive responsibility were then the culprit—i.e. San Jose's problem in these games was more focus than intensity, as if they had to find a new way to lose.

Against Calgary, the Sharks came out strong but made mistakes to go down 2-0 early. Then, they reverted to form, entering the third period down 4-1 and prompting assistant coach Trent Yawney to again say they needed to compete harder—they climbed back in but still lost 4-3.

Every new game, there is another way the team has let me down. There is no reason to believe a team that is playing poorly when it normally plays well, will play well when they normally play badly.

In some ways, I would rather they just start choking now: I can divorce myself more easily from all the players who will not be in teal next season. It also keeps me from getting my hopes up and dashed, which is why I have assessed that this team has a mere one chance in a dozen to make it through the Western Conference.