The card
All cards →+0.9
Pine Net Rating v0.1: goals above replacement per 82 games (+0.4 over his 34). 51% among 250 defensemen, 2nd pair.
- Position
- D
- Number
- #7
- Shoots
- R
- Age
- 26
- Size
- 6'5", 215 lb
- Ice time
- 13:24 a game
- Games
- 34
- Status
- Re-signed June 28, 2026 (3yr)
- Pieces here
- 38
2025-26 regular season with BUF (previous club): 34 games, 455 minutes.
2026-27: +0.5 (range -15.1 to +16.0). 2030-31: -2.0 (range -35.8 to +31.8).
- Market value
- $4.2M
- Cap hit
- $4.5M
- Surplus
- −$300K
- Positive value
- 45%
Market value is what the league pays a defenseman at his rating percentile this season, from 214 contracts; in 2026-27 dollars against a $104M ceiling. Positive value is the share of 2,000 simulated futures over his 3 remaining years in which that value meets his cap hit.
The number on each bar is his percentile among league defensemen with 200 or more minutes at 5-on-5 (special teams: 30 or more minutes on the unit); each block prints the size of that group. Higher is better on every bar; chances against are inverted so 90% always reads well.
Sources: NHL.com for the roster, bio and counting line; MoneyPuck for expected goals, on-ice chances, blocks and penalties; PuckPedia and CapWages for the contract. Updated 2026-09-13. The rating, the forecast and the value line are this site's own, from public data, with the method published.
On the record
Called Shots →Luca Cagnoni plays fewer than 42 regular-season games for the San Jose Sharks in 2026-27. Scored off his official NHL regular-season games-played total for San Jose only: 41 or fewer is a hit, 42 or more is a miss, including if he reaches 42 after being recalled from the Barracuda, and including if he is traded (games for another club do not count).
Dmitry Orlov records more power-play time on ice than Luca Cagnoni in San Jose's regular-season opener against Florida on October 1, 2026.
Jacob Trouba has the highest shorthanded ice time per game of any San Jose defenseman across the club's first 20 games of 2026-27.
San Jose allows fewer than 3.54 goals per game across the first 20 games of 2026-27, an improvement on the 3.54 it allowed across all 82 games of 2025-26.
Eric Pohlkamp plays 10 or more NHL regular-season games for San Jose in 2026-27.
Luca Cagnoni averages under 0:30 a game of shorthanded time on ice across San Jose's first 20 games of 2026-27.
Keaton Verhoeff does not sign an NHL entry-level contract with San Jose on or before May 31, 2027, and returns to North Dakota for a third college season.
Michael Kesselring averages more than 0:51 a game of power-play time on ice across San Jose's first 20 regular-season games of 2026-27.
San Jose's penalty kill finishes the 2026-27 regular season ranked higher among the 32 NHL clubs than San Jose's power play.
Sam Dickinson averages 1:00 or more of power-play time per game across San Jose's first 20 games of 2026-27.
Written about him
Michael Kesselring Went From Seventy Power Play Minutes To Two Seconds In One Season
Michael Kesselring played 69:49 on the power play for Utah in 2024-25 across all 82 games, then two seconds in 34 injury-shortened games for Buffalo. San Jose's blue line gave 82 percent of its power-play minutes to two men last season, Dmitry Orlov and John Klingberg, and Klingberg, a right shot, is gone. The club's roster feed lists four right-shot defensemen and two of them have never played an NHL game. Jacob Trouba, the other one who has, owns one power-play point across his last 158 games. That leaves the Utah season as the only evidence San Jose has that anybody on its right side can do the job.
Kesselring deep dive, the NHL Edge layer: elite tools confirmed, and one correction
The tracking data: the tools are elite, and they travel
Kesselring's power-play efficiency in Utah: a functional PP2 with a PP1 weapon attached
What he actually did on the man advantage in Utah
The Michael Kesselring deep dive: the 0-2-2 that lies, and the top-four defenseman underneath it
Michael Kesselring, in full