Marc-Edouard Vlasic doesn’t boast a flashy style, but that hasn’t stopped many San Jose Sharks fans from becoming fans of his steady defensive game.
Those same fans would probably be happy to hear that his agent told CSNBayArea.com’s Kevin Kurz that Vlasic’s five-year extension includes a “full no-trade clause.”
Vlasic has seen a lot of NHL hockey for a 25-year-old defenseman.
In six seasons, the blueliner has already played in 471 regular season games. He’s been sturdy in almost every one of those campaigns, playing in at least 80 games in five of those six years.
Vlasic might not ever top the 36 points he generated in 2008-09, but Fear the Fin explains why his 23 points didn’t tell the whole story about his value last season.
... The 25-year-old controlled play at evens matching up against opposing teams’ best forwards all season long. The only defensemen in the NHL to face both a higher quality of competition than Vlasic this past year and finish with a higher Corsi rate (an on-ice shot differential metric that tracks closely with puck possession and scoring chances) were all-world veterans Nicklas Lidstrom and Kimmo Timonen. Which is fitting since the mark of Vlasic’s game, even when he broke into the league as a 19-year-old six years ago, has always been his veteran-like positional play and defensive prowess.