Whicker: Kings have to deal with Sharks' Brent Burns

[email protected]

It’s like traveling to England and taking your first drive on the left side of the yellow line. Doable. But dangerous.

Brent Bus of the Sharks can navigate that transition better than almost anyone. He was a wing. Then a defenseman. Then a wing. Then a defenseman again. Among today’s NHL players, only Wiipeg’s Dustin Byfuglien has been able to handle such queen-on-a-chessboard moves, but Bus scored 27 goals with 75 points for San Jose. That means he outscored Anze Kopitar and Alex Ovechkin, among others, in the regular season, and he was the No. 2 scorer among defensemen, behind Eric Karlsson of Ottawa.

In Game 1 of this series Bus assisted Joe Pavelski on the first San Jose goal and then drilled a goal from the perimeter when Joel Ward won a faceoff. San Jose won, 4-3, and Bus promised to be a problem for the Kings in Game 2 Saturday night.

Asked how difficult such a F-to-D move is for a player, Kings coach Darryl Sutter laughed and said, “It looks pretty easy when he does it.”

At 6-foot-5 and 230, Bus can be a mountainous presence in from of either net. The Sharks got him from Miesota and made him a winger midway through the 2012-13 season, but then moved him to the backline before the next season.

The stated reason was to deal with big offensive people like Kopitar and Anaheim’s Ryan Getzlaf. No one knew that he would bring the points and goals with him, in even more abundance.

“It takes time,” Bus said before Game 1. “We’re all still leaing. You’d be leaing something about defense if you played it your whole life.

“The reason players don’t go back and forth more often is that the positions are so different. Some people don’t like to play D. There are different pressures and stresses. Playing forward is harder on your body, but I think I can do it because I enjoy both. I feel like I can be a top player at both positions at all times.”

The Sharks had good production from the back line when Dan Boyle was back there, but their most consistent defenseman in recent years has been the defensive-minded Marc-Edouard Vlasic.

Jake Muzzin of the Kings speaks for most people on D: “I know I couldn’t do that.’

For one thing, it’s hard to think like a mirror. Hockey is too fast for a player to survive with slow instincts, and Bus has to un-lea and re-lea new tricks whenever he changes positions.

“He’s got size, and speed and hands,” Muzzin said of Bus. “He’s a guy we have to look at with special attention.

Advertisement

“A lot of it is position. If I were to go on offense, I would be staying back, wouldn’t be aggressive, because I’d be thinking defense first. Forwards have been forwards their whole career, so it’s something that comes natural. But he’s probably more dangerous as a D,”

The Sharks brought free agent Paul Martin from Pittsburgh to calm the waters, which he’s done. He frequently plays alongside Bus.

“You can have your instincts,” Martin said, “but so many things change. For him, he just plays his game. He’s able to change a game with his skills. Defensively, he’s improved in a lot of things that people usually associate with defense, but he’s able to transend the position. It takes a special talent.”

Most people around the game agree that Bus is where he should be. It’s easier to find a winger with impact than a forward.

“For one thing, he’s on the ice more as a defenseman,” Martin said. “He can pick his places and manage the game better. But it’s tougher because as a forward you’re covered by goalies and defensemen. Very rarely does anyone notice your mistakes. As a defenseman, the microscope is on you a lot more.”

You don’t need a microscope to detect fear in a player, and Bus dealt with his fears long ago. As a kid he was terrified of snakes, which isn’t unusual. But how many people react to that by bringing in snakes? Bus has had as many as 150 as the same time, and says they’re a lot less hassle than other pets.

He also has more than his share of tattoos, and he and wife Susan named their second son Jagger, as in Mick.

“I’ve felt comfortable right away, making those moves,” Bus said. “I don’t feel like a fish out of water. If they need you to do something, you do it.”