Manny Malhotra

VANCOUVER--What has been the difference in the newest version of the Vancouver Canucks compared to the same time last year?

Let us take a quick look at who's in and who's out in the bottom-six roles:

October 2009:

As of last season, Mike Modano was the only player in the NHL still under contract with the same franchise he played for while the San Jose Sharks completed their expansion season of 1991-92.

In other words, Modano had been playing at the NHL level as a member the Dallas Stars for longer than both myself and the Sharks have been alive.

Both born in 1991, the Sharks and I obviously share the same appreciation for the amazing career Modano has already accomplished, because reports amongst the professional hockey writers suggest the Sharks are interested in Modano's services.

In the third piece of my series, "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly," assessing the San Jose Sharks offseason, we examine the ugly or non-moves of the summer. (See the following links to read about the team's good and bad decisions in free agency.)

The thing that makes these decisions ugly is the business of the NHL: It is not so much that they were bad moves as they were unfortunate, but necessary, to keep a competitive team under the salary cap.

The San Jose Sharks began the offseason with a string of moves that not only made hockey sense, but made their fanbase happy.

With the trend of unheralded goaltenders succeeding in the NHL, the Sharks' front office (headed by general manager Doug Wilson) made their first critical decision of the offseason by parting ways with starting netminder Evgeni Nabokov.

Nabokov, who had been dominant in the regular season over the past decade, made over $5 million last season and wasn't going to take a discount to stay in San Jose.

As reported by TSN at 1:11 PDT the deal with Dan Hamhuis is done. The contract amount is $4.5 million a year for six years.

Other teams offered more money but Vancouver was the team that Hamhuis wanted to go to.

That now brings the total to nine D-men that are under contract (if you count Shane O'Briens qualifing offer) and someone will have to go to get under the cap before the season starts.

Look for GM Mike Gillis to try and trade one of the D-men that have no trade contracts and are over $3 million (Kevin Bieksa).

In my last article, I outlined the San Jose Sharks roster as it stands (assuming players tendered qualifying offers stayed in teal).

I even postured on the deficiencies that would likely keep them from repeating the success of last season.

As promised, this article offers my suggestions to remedy that problem. Since exact figures for some salaries are unknown, all of these steps are done under the estimation of the team having about $3 million of cap room.

Every team needs good grinders. The guys you send out to take tough faceoffs in their own end, to shadow the other team's best scoring lines, to provide some energy to a listless team, or just to chew up minutes and give your stars a break.

In 2008-09, general manager Doug Wilson decided he was not getting enough from his third and fourth lines, and had dumped five of the six players by the Olympic break of 2010. While the new players actually scored fewer goals for the San Jose Sharks than the previous season's, the team saw improvement on defence and in the faceoff circle.

The San Jose Sharks lost Game One because the Chicago Blackhawks dominated the tempo, the hitting, AND the score sheet.

Where did I get this interesting factoid?

NBC's coverage of Game One, and the Chicago Sun Times, of course!

This morning, I woke up literally and figuratively as a SAN JOSE Shark fan, a.k.a "TibKid", and developed a more realistic analysis.

Let's take each point and consider:

TEMPO

When writing an awesome Bleacher article, I lose myself in Getty Images World. For those of you non-contributors, you have to upload images to publish your articles.

I could upload the wonderful images from my popular San Jose Sharks fan blog tibkids.tumblr.com ...PLUG....BUT I don't understand the terms "Terms of Use."

Begin Slideshow

For a team from Northern California, the San Jose Sharks sure knew how to celebrate 4/20 in style!

In a must win game, the San Jose Sharks showed their mettle once again by putting the Avalanche away midway through the first overtime session.

In what is turning out to be a highly competitive series, the San Jose Sharks have regained the home ice advantage they earned throughout the regular season.  With two out of the last three games in San Jose, the Sharks have now have a significant advantage in the seven game series.