{"id":492855,"date":"2026-06-29T13:06:07","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=492855"},"modified":"2026-06-29T13:06:07","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:06:07","slug":"michael-kesselring-signed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2026\/06\/29\/michael-kesselring-signed\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Sharks Sign Newly Acquired Defenceman"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2024\/08\/02\/nhl-sweaters-the-best-and-worst-of-the-san-jose-sharks\/\" target=\"_self\">San Jose Sharks<\/a> have inked one of their newest acquisitions. <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.sportsnet.ca\/nhl\/article\/sharks-sign-defenceman-michael-kesselring-to-three-year-deal\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">News emerged<\/a> on Sunday night that defenceman Michael Kesselring signed a three-year deal worth $13.5 million for the life of the contract. This works out to an average $4.5 million cap hit and the deal runs through the end of the 2028-29 season.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"bluesky-embed\" data-bluesky-uri=\"at:\/\/did:plc:zazcjahlcb3jfrhcriq7xpn7\/app.bsky.feed.post\/3mpgv7enwc22e\" data-bluesky-cid=\"bafyreihnnutp6cbe7wfmtwurqjscsgqvik4lzcnpyqdx7tefaymgru7wra\">\n<p lang=\"en\">The Sharks are inking Michael Kesselring to a three-year extension! \ud83d\udc40San Jose traded for the 26-year old defenceman on Jun. 16.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; <a  href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/did:plc:zazcjahlcb3jfrhcriq7xpn7?ref_src=embed\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">TSN (@tsnofficial.bsky.social)<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/did:plc:zazcjahlcb3jfrhcriq7xpn7\/post\/3mpgv7enwc22e?ref_src=embed\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">2026-06-29T16:17:15.419Z<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/embed.bsky.app\/static\/embed.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Michael Kesselring Signed to Three-Year Deal by San Jose Sharks<\/h2>\n<p>Kesselring has played for the<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2024\/07\/11\/nhl-sweaters-best-and-worst-of-the-arizona-coyotes\/\" target=\"_self\"> Arizona Coyotes<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2026\/06\/26\/sebastian-cossa-trade-utah\/\" target=\"_self\">Utah Hockey Club<\/a>, and Buffalo Sabres across his four-year NHL career. The <span>Florence, South Carolina native had two assists in 34 games for the Sabres. Kesselring was limited after coming off a career-best season in Utah&#8217;s first season in Salt Lake City.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The 26-year-old has 12 goals and 43 assists for 55 points in 190 career games. He was originally taken by the<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2026\/06\/23\/oilers-hire-mike-babcock\/\" target=\"_self\"> Edmonton Oilers<\/a> in the sixth round, 164th overall of the 2018 NHL Draft. <span>He was picked up by Buffalo alongside Josh Doan in the 2025 off-season in the deal that sent JJ Peterka to Utah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Kesselring<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2026\/06\/17\/sabres-kesselring-trade\/\" target=\"_self\"> was traded again<\/a> in Friday&#8217;s 2026 NHL Draft along with the 27th pick to San Jose for the 20th selection. Buffalo ended up taking <span>Ilia Morozov, while San Jose moved up to 21 to get Ryan Lin.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" style=\"max-width: px\"><smartframe-embed class=\"smartframe_wp_element\" customer-id=\"b0c95bc04383cef69c6b47df872135cf\" image-id=\"WmOB5Vff6IFO\" style=\"width: 100%; display: inline-flex; max-width: 4686px; aspect-ratio: 4686\/3456;\" ><\/smartframe-embed><\/p>\n<p><span>(Credit Image: \u00a9 Thurman James\/Cal Sport Media)<\/span><\/p>\n<h3>What It Means<\/h3>\n<p>Kesselring never found his footing with the Sabres, and this deal gives him a chance to start fresh. The Sharks have worked hard to make over their roster and general manager Mike Grier has helped foster improvement in a very young roster.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;ve seen that Kesselring can be a very strong blueliner from his time in Utah. However, he&#8217;ll now have a chance to be part of a roster that has some dynamic young players. Macklin Celebrini and Will Smith have fans in the Bay Area excited for hockey again.<\/p>\n<p>The Sharks have been making numerous changes to their defensive group. Inking Kesselring to this deal will help that cause.<\/p>\n<p><em>Main photo by: James Guillory-Imagn Images<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The San Jose Sharks have inked one of their newest acquisitions. News emerged on Sunday night that defenceman Michael Kesselring signed a three-year deal worth $13.5 million for the life of the contract. This works out to an average $4.5 million cap hit and the deal runs through the end of the 2028-29 season. The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2352,"featured_media":477991,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25,4547,34,4548],"tags":[8048,7356,662,6905],"class_list":["post-492855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sharks","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","tag-michael-kesselring","tag-mike-grier","tag-nhl-free-agency","tag-san-jose-sharks-news"],"modified_by":"Dan Mount, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2352"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=492855"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492855\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":492859,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492855\/revisions\/492859"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/477991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=492855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=492855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=492855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}