Oct. 15th: Indirectly confirming that Afanasyev passed through waivers unscathed, the Sharks announced that they’ve reassigned him to the AHL’s San Jose Barracuda.
Oct. 14th: The Sharks have placed winger Egor Afanasyev on waivers, according to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet. He began the season on injured reserve but is now healthy and will head to AHL San Jose if he clears.
With the Sharks comfortable carrying eight defensemen to start the season, that only leaves one extra forward spot on their roster. Keeping Afanasyev around would have meant waiving or reassigning a member of an offense that’s scored nine goals in two games so far, something they weren’t willing to do. It’s a testament that despite scratching 2025 No. 2 overall pick Michael Misa for both of those games, they’re intent on keeping him around and will give him a look tonight as their third-line center, per Sheng Peng of San Jose Hockey Now. They’re also reluctant to reassign the waiver-exempt Collin Graf, who’s coming out of the lineup to make way for Misa’s NHL debut.
Afanasyev had a good preseason showing for San Jose, posting six scoring chances in three games and converting on one of them. His chances of making the roster, however, were stifled by a minor lower-body injury late in camp. The 24-year-old signed a one-year, $800K contract with the Sharks back in May, attempting an NHL comeback after spurning their qualifying offer last year and opting to sign with CSKA Moscow of the Kontinental Hockey League. The 24-year-old remained on San Jose’s reserve list and returned to them following a seven-goal, 21-point showing in 53 games for the army-affiliated team.
He was only on their reserve list after they acquired his signing rights from the Predators for Ozzy Wiesblatt early last summer, though. He’s never played a game in either the NHL or AHL for San Jose, ending the 2023-24 regular season as a member of the Nashville organization, which drafted him in the second round in 2019. The 6’3″, 200-lb winger has 19 NHL games under his belt for the Preds, although he only scored one goal and had a -8 rating while averaging 11:04 per game.