SAN JOSE – The Sharks’ extreme offseason makeover continued Monday as they signed free agent veteran forwards Tyler Toffoli and Alexander Wennberg to multiyear contracts, adding to an already sizeable group of new players that general manager Mike Grier hopes will make the team more competitive.
“Sometimes it takes some time to do things, and there’s still a lot of work to be done,” Grier, now in his third season, said Monday, the first day of NHL free agency. “But I think now we’re starting to at least head towards being the type of team I would like us to be.”
Toffoli, a winger who has played for seven different teams over the past five seasons, was signed to a four-year, $24 million contract with a full no-movement clause. Considering the Sharks’ prospect pool, led by Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith, Toffoli was interested in coming to San Jose.
“It seems like the team is going in the right direction here,”Toffoli said. “Just excited to be part of the process.”
“Tyler was at the top of our list,” Grier said.
The Sharks then added center Wennberg, 29, to a two-year, $10 million deal that contains a full no-trade clause for the first season.
The 32-year-old Toffoli, a 2014 Stanley Cup champion with the Los Angeles Kings, has scored 260 goals in his 12-year career, including 67 in the last two seasons. Wennberg has 335 points in 712 NHL games and has spent most of his career as a middle-six forward in stints with Columbus, Florida, Seattle, and the New York Rangers.
Both players figure to not only add some badly needed scoring punch to the Sharks, who had the second-fewest goals in the NHL last season with 181, but also provide some insulation to Smith, the fourth-overall selection in 2023, and Celebrini, the top pick this year.
Smith, 19, led all NCAA Division I players in scoring last season with 71 points in 41 games for Boston College and signed with the Sharks in May. Celebrini of Boston University was the Hobey Baker Award winner as college hockey’s top player with 64 points in 38 games.
Those players needed some support after the Sharks finished last season with a 19-54-9 record, missing the playoffs for a fifth straight year.
Toffoli and Wennberg, perhaps not coincidentally, have the same representative as Celebrini in Pat Brisson.
“You can just see how skilled he is and how hard he works,” Toffoli said of Celebrini. “I’ve heard nothing but great things about him, being part of the same agency. It’s an exciting time, and I think that’s also another major reason for me wanting to come here, which was to be able to play with him.”
Celebrini, 18, still hasn’t officially declared whether he’ll turn pro or return to school for a second season. However, the addition of forwards Toffoli and Wennberg would seem to provide the kind of support his dad, Dr. Rick Celebrini, a Warriors’ vice president, wanted for his son before he started his NHL career.
Toffoli had a leadership role with the rebuilding …read more
Source:: The Mercury News – Entertainment
