{"id":901927,"date":"2026-09-23T01:08:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-23T01:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/901927\/"},"modified":"2026-09-23T01:08:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T01:08:11","slug":"pacific-notes-smith-zuccarello-ducks-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/901927\/","title":{"rendered":"Pacific Notes: Smith, Zuccarello, Ducks \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n By Brian La Rose<\/a> |
\n at September 22, 2026 6:59 pm <\/p>\n

While some long-term contracts for core youngsters were wrapped up ahead of the September 15th deadline last week, one who didn\u2019t get something done was Sharks forward Will Smith<\/a>.\u00a0 Late last week, the youngster told reporters including Sheng Peng of San Jose Hockey Now<\/a> that he\u2019s not worried about the state of negotiations.\u00a0 GM Mike Grier seemed to echo that sentiment while adding that talks are expected to continue throughout the season.\u00a0 Smith had 24 goals and 35 assists in 69 games last season for San Jose, a solid sophomore year.\u00a0 If he takes another jump forward as many expect the fourth overall pick in 2023 to do, he could find himself in line for a new contract with a double-digit AAV heading into 2027-28.<\/p>\n

More from the Pacific:<\/p>\n

Kings winger Mats Zuccarello<\/a> has been skating in a non-contact jersey recently, notes Zach Dooley of LA Kings Insider<\/a>. The veteran is dealing with a minor shoulder injury and head coach Peter Laviolette indicated that they are erring on the side of caution in terms of clearing him for contact.\u00a0 While he might not see much preseason action, it certainly seems like he\u2019ll be good to go for their season opener.\u00a0 Zuccarello had 15 goals and 39 assists in 59 games with Minnesota last season.
\nA pair of Ducks have their availability for opening night now in question. Derek Lee of The Hockey News relays (Twitter link<\/a>) that defenseman Drew Helleson<\/a> is out for the next week due to a lower-body injury while winger A.J. Greer<\/a> (upper body) is likely in the same boat.\u00a0 At this point, it\u2019s unclear if they\u2019ll be cleared to return next week but both are hoping to do so with Greer being less likely.\u00a0 Helleson has a chance to lock down a bigger role on Anaheim\u2019s back end this season following several departures while Greer was a key acquisition this summer to add more grit to their bottom six.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Brian La Rose | at September 22, 2026 6:59 pm While some long-term contracts for core youngsters…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":901928,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[258994,1419,64,63,470247,7526,151209,575,7527,85,10221],"class_list":["post-901927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-a-j-greer","tag-anaheim-ducks","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-drew-helleson","tag-los-angeles-kings","tag-mats-zuccarello","tag-nhl","tag-san-jose-sharks","tag-sports","tag-will-smith"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/901927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=901927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/901927\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/901928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=901927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=901927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=901927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}