PHOTO: Bildbyrån
A lot has happened at the San José Sharks.
Now even superstar Erik Karlsson is speaking out about the future.
– I think something good can come from this, he says to The Athletic.
Last season resulted in 35 points in 50 games for an injury-plagued player Erik Karlsson. The upcoming NHL season will be the Swede’s fifth year with the San Jose Sharks, who have changed a lot during the spring and summer.
Karlsson’s words
After all the rumors and the large player turnover, the Swede is now opening up about the future. And assures that he has not asked at all to be traded away from the Sharks.
– I have been fully committed here for a long time, he says in an interview with The Athletic.
– In the beginning, it didn’t go quite as planned. There are many different reasons for that, which I will not go into detail. But now I am hopeful about the future here. I hope we can move in a more successful direction again. If it will happen this year? Hard to say. But I think something good can come out of this.
Karlsson signed an eight-year contract after the move from the Ottawa Senators with a salary cap hit of eleven million dollars. Ahead of the new season, he hopes to be able to contribute more out on the ice and, above all, be more injury-free.
– The injuries I have suffered since I came here… Some of them could probably have been prevented to a certain extent, while others were unavoidable, says the Swede in the interview.
“Careful”
The 32-year-old admits that he will take care of his body more in the future in order to stay injury-free for longer.
– Now I think I will be more careful when injuries do happen, even if it means that I will miss some time here and there, in order to ultimately avoid longer periods of absence at the end of the year.
Erik Karlsson is one of the NHL’s top scoring defensemen in recent years. In 14 seasons, the Swede has delivered an impressive 660 points in 838 games.
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