Kurtenbach: Sharks GM Mike Grier authored a draft-day masterpiece. The rest of the NHL should be terrified

There are levels to this whole “being a general manager” thing.

And right now, San Jose Sharks GM Mike Grier is operating on a plane of existence that nobody else in the NHL — or, frankly, anyone in any sport — can fathom.

The leader of the teal has San Jose knocking on the door of not just the playoffs, but a legitimate window of serious contention in the coming years.

There’s some kid named Macklin Celebrini who helped with that.

But Friday night’s first round of the 2026 NHL Draft? That might just have been Grier’s masterwork, when he put the final pieces of his elaborate puzzle on the board.

There were rumors, suggestions even, as to what might go down, and yet the reality the situation felt deeply far fetched. How Grier peered through the fog of war to make a night like Friday happen is, quite frankly, beyond my comprehension.

Because just a few weeks ago, the question for the Sharks GM coming into this draft was agonizingly simple.

Should he take Swedish phenom Ivar Stenberg — arguably the most NHL-ready prospect in the draft — or plug a gaping hole with a young defenseman at No. 2 overall?

It was the ultimate draft-day dilemma. I leaned one way (blueliners win cups, baby), and I talked to countless hockey folks who leaned the other way, because, simply put, Stenberg is sick. (In a good way.)

Sometimes we even just agreed to disagree. What a concept!

But it was the exact kind of issue that usually paralyzes general managers.

Lesser general managers, that is.

Because Grier looked at the options available and said, “Why not both?”

Instead of agonizing over positional value, he manufactured his own reality, bending the draft board to match his vision.

He made shrewd moves to add veteran depth on the blue line. It was exactly the kind of insulation needed for adding a dynamic winger like Stenberg.

That roster camouflage gave him the cover to take the best player available without hesitation. (You always need a contingency plan.)

And Stenberg is an absolute prize. A scoring machine, he tore up the second-best hockey league in the world, the Swedish Hockey League, as a teenager. He made the World Championships look like a beer league. He’s a player that pops on highlights, but shines in full-game action. Does he ever make mistakes? I’m still waiting to see one. It’s kind of annoying, actually.

He’s so smart, so skilled, so well-rounded that the winger might end up being a center in the NHL. He’ll probably be awesome at that, too.

Taking that kid is how you make the most of incredible lottery luck, like the Sharks landed this spring.

But Grier wasn’t done playing with the league.

By trading William Eklund to the Ottawa Senators for the No. 9 overall pick in the draft, he not only cleared a winger spot for Stenberg, but he also gave himself the opportunity to pull off one of the greatest draft-day 1-2s in recent NHL history.

Everyone knew where he was going at No. 9 — the blue line.

And then the rest of the league let him have Keaton Verhoeff with that second first-round pick.

How did he know the board would fall this way when he made the Eklund trade?

A magician never reveals his tricks.

Had the Sharks just walked away with one prospect — Stenberg or Verhoeff — it would have been a hilarious coup.

Adding both? Big mistake letting that happen, NHL.

Oh, and for good measure, Grier took pick No. 27 in the first round, added a couple Day 2 picks, and moved up to No. 21 to take another right-handed shot defenseman in the smooth-skating, puck-moving Ryan Lin, who looked like a surefire “lottery” pick only a few months ago.

(Grier has now added three right-handed defensemen — players that are worth their weight in gold in the modern NHL — this month.)

Verhoeff is probably be a year or two away from the NHL. But goodness gracious, what a defender he could be.

He’s a massive kid who projects to violently lock down the defensive zone for the next decade. He has the potential to anchor a power play, too. There’s a reason he was the No. 1 defenseman in this draft until the world juniors. We won’t get an honest answer now, but I wonder if Verhoeff ever dropped from that top spot for the Sharks.

After all, he’s something close to Grier’s ideal blueliner: Serious size, heavy game, and a two-way prowess that’s built upon substance, not flash.

Heaven forbid he stuggled as a 17-year-old on the back-end playing for one of the finest college hockey programs in the country. He could have stayed in juniors and beaten up on smaller, lesser competition, and kept his draft stock sky-high.

Instead, he had the audacity to not be a top-pairing guy for a Frozen Four team.

But he’ll be a top-pairing guy at North Dakota next season, if he goes back, and this time next year, the rest of hockey will probably be asking themselves “did we overthink this?”

I can tell you the answer to that now: yes.

Grier had his cake, ate it, and then grabbed and scarfed down another slice.

Because in the modern NHL, you hoard great players until the league forces you to stop.

No one has stopped Grier yet.

And those moves, a terrifying nucleus was finalized.

It’s dense, it’s young, and it’s going to be an absolute nightmare for the rest of the Pacific Division.

And soon thereafter, the NHL.

Stenberg will be expected to hit the ground running. You don’t put up historic numbers in Sweden to spend your rookie year eating popcorn in the press box.

He’ll be riding shotgun with the big boys on opening night. Will he be Michael Misa’s winger, or Celebrini’s?

Make no mistake, one is getting him.

Meanwhile, Verhoeff will be worth the wait.

But take a step back and look at the sheer magnitude of talent Grier has amassed in San Jose.

Celebrini, Will Smith, Collin Graf, Igor Chernyshov, Misa, Sam Dickinson, Stenberg, Verhoeff, Lin, and Yaroslav Askarov and Josh Ravensbergen in net.

This is one of the greatest assemblages of young talent in NHL history. No caveats needed.

If this kind of young core isn’t good enough to get the job done — and I mean the big job — then it’s simply not happening in San Jose.

That is a team to be reckoned with. Right now.

And especially later.

Because when this core fully matures, the rest of the league is going to look back at Friday night and wonder how they let Grier get away with grand larceny.

The man had a vision. Perhaps even psychic powers. And then he executed his audacious plan flawlessly.

That’s how you general manage.