The Dany Heatley Non-Factor

When Dany joined the Sharks, I read a lot about how much Ottawa hated him and was glad to see him go. It made me question why so many former fans of his would like to see him go to another team (similar to Jumbo when he came from Boston). It’s funny that both Thornton and Heatley have the stigma of non-playoff performers and yet they are both on the Sharks. So why is it that the Sens hated on Heater so much and celebrated when he left?

I know when Heater came to the Sharks, I was definitely drinking the kool-aid, especially after his hat trick in his first game at HP Pavilion. There was so much hype with him coming over and playing with Thornton that everyone imagined him going back to his 50+ goal scoring ways. I don’t think that Sharks fans knew that Heater was coming from a line that was already filthy and had gone all the way to the finals against Anaheim in 2007, so it wasn’t like he needed to be rejuvenated in his career. But give him credit where credit is due, his first year with the Sharks with 39 goals and 43 assists is a very good year. Add in the 2 goals and 11 assists in 14 playoff games also caps off the good year. This season is another story, however…

This year has not been Dany’s best, to say the least. With the exception of his shortened 03-04 season, he may not make the 67 points that he scored in his rookie season with Atlanta; he would need 9 points in the last 8 games to match it. Heatley has also been outscored by the rookie phenom Couture, who is known more for his two-way play than scoring. Not to take anything away from Cooch, who is having an outstanding season, but Heater, come on man, you are being paid to score goals and you aren’t doing your job! If you were getting paid Cheechoo money, I wouldn’t mind so much but making $7.5mil for a 20-goal scorer is just not right.

The other thing that really bugs me about Heatley is the number of turnovers he has. I swear it seems to be more than a few per game and they always lead to odd-man rushes the other way. Looking further into it, he does have the 14^th worse turnovers in the league. Not surprisingly, Joe Thornton is on that same list in second with 84. However, the main difference is that Jumbo has 104 takeaways to make that a positive ratio while Heatley only has 26 – ouch. Heater needs to stop passing and taking charge with his lethal shot. We already have too many passers on the team and not enough finishers, so step up Heater!

Now I know there are going to be a lot of haters to this article and of me being critical of him but I am honestly more afraid of Heatley rivaling some other Bay Area athlete who is loving his contract for doing little to no work. When Dany got a two game suspension last week, I was the least bit worried since I knew the team would do fine without him. That tells me something; when the top paid player is out two games and the team plays almost better without him (they won both games), maybe him leaving at the end of the season wouldn’t be such a bad thing? But, trading him in the off season will certainly be difficult since he has that pesky no-trade clause, not to mention moving $7.5mil to another team in the salary cap era is next to impossible. So I guess us Sharks fans may be stuck with the currently underachieving and overpaid winger for another three seasons.

There is one saving grace that Dany could use to silence any dissenters out there and that is to show up and dominate in the playoffs. It’s funny how people forget how crappy you were in the season when you show up to play in the post season. If history is any indicator though, I wouldn’t bet the house: 12 goals in 48 career playoff games is not something a pure goal scorer should be proud of. But if he manages to put more pucks in the net and help carry the team when it matters most, I will become a huge fan and regret writing this article. Don’t get me wrong, I want him to succeed since that would turn into the Sharks succeeding. But don’t fool yourself as it doesn’t go hand-in-hand; the Sharks can and will succeed without him.

Sharks Fun Fact: The Sharks roster is made up of only 4 nationalities: Canadian (18), American (2), Finnish (2), and Swedish (2).

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