SAN JOSE — Sharks general manager Mike Grier said this week that he expects to keep and make the No. 2 overall pick when the NHL draft begins today at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles.

After that, buckle up.

The Sharks, as of Thursday, had eight other picks in the draft, with their selections at 30th and 33rd overall undoubtedly in play.

As he looks to strengthen the cellar-dwelling Sharks for next year and beyond, Grier could package those picks, perhaps along with another asset, to move up in the draft and select a player they covet. Or he could use his draft capital to get a player who could help immediately, as the Sharks try to take a step forward after a dismal 20-50-12 season.

Or the Sharks could keep the picks and further bolster an already deep prospect pool.

“I think everything’s on the table,” Grier said Tuesday. “We’re definitely open to moving (the 30th overall selection), but we also know, looking at our board, that there’s going to be a good player there available to help us.

“Drafts never go how you expect. So to use that with another piece to maybe move up into the first round, if there’s a player that we really like that starts to slide, that’s definitely a possibility as well.”

The draft lottery-winning New York Islanders are expected to take defenseman Matthew Schaefer with the first overall pick, and several longtime draft analysts, such as TSN’s Bob McKenzie and Sportsnet’s Sam Cosentino, have center Michael Misa, the Canadian Hockey League scoring champion, as the second-best player available.

Whether that means the Sharks take Misa is unclear. The Chicago Blackhawks, who own the third overall selection, now reportedly believe the Sharks could take Anton Frondell at No. 2.

Grier, this week, sang the praises of both Misa and Frondell, a physical two-way centerman with a terrific shot and tantalizing playmaking ability. Other players whom the Sharks might consider include center Caleb Desnoyers and winger Porter Martone.

Misa had 134 points in 65 games with the OHL’s Saginaw Spirit this season. Frondell, competing against older players in his native Sweden, had 25 points in 29 games in HockeyAllsvenskan for Djurgardens and also had standout moments in international competition.

Unlike last season when the No. 1 pick, Macklin Celebrini, stepped into the Sharks roster right away, it’s probably a stretch to think that either Misa or Frondell are NHL-ready as 18-year-olds.

But long-term, Misa or Frondell, if taken by San Jose, figure to play inside the Sharks’ top-six forward group for years to come, along with Celebrini, 19, Will Smith, 20, and William Eklund, 22.

“I think I had the year to be able to go No. 1,” Misa said Thursday in Los Angeles. “It’s what teams are deciding. Coming out of this year, I really had no regrets with how I performed. It’s not up to me at this point.”

After today’s first round, rounds two through seven will be held Saturday morning.

The Sharks, as of now, are also slated to pick 33rd (their own) and 53rd (from Ottawa) in the second round, 95th (from Edmonton) in the third round, 115th (from St. Louis via Columbus) and 124th (from Winnipeg via Dallas) in the fourth round, 150th (from Colorado) in the fifth round, and 210th (from New Jersey) in the seventh round.

Still, the focus, for now, will be on the first round and what the Sharks and other teams might do. San Jose is one of eight teams with multiple first-round picks this year, and nearly every club, outside of the Pittsburgh Penguins, is actively seeking to improve or remain a Stanley Cup contender.

If the Sharks package the 30th and 33rd overall selections to move up in the draft, they would probably be looking to select a defenseman.

Suppose the Sharks were able to move up to the 20th to 24th overall range. In that case, they could be looking at taking Boston University’s Sascha Boumedienne, Cameron Reid of the OHL’s Kitchener Rangers or Blake Fiddler of the WHL’s Edmonton Oil Kings.

“When you have that kind of draft capital, that’s the whole reason you do it,” Cosentino told Bay Area News Group earlier this month. “Because you get into a situation like this draft where there’s not a lot separating the 20th through 50th guys. Now you can use that draft capital to really hone in on a guy that you want.”

No offer for Gregor

The Sharks will not be giving veteran forward Noah Gregor a qualifying offer, this newspaper has learned. The 26-year-old Gregor, who was a pending restricted free agent with arbitration rights, is now set to become a UFA.

Gregor was acquired by the Sharks from Ottawa on March 7 as part of the surprising trade that sent forwards Fabian Zetterlund, Tristen Robins, and a fourth-round pick this year to the Senators. From the Sharks’ perspective, the key part of the deal was receiving center Zack Ostapchuk and a second-round draft pick for this year.

Allowing Gregor to become a UFA was not unexpected.

Gregor, in his second stint with San Jose, had one assist in 12 games with the Sharks after the trade. In 52 games this season between the Sharks and Senators, Gregor had four goals and three assists and averaged just over 11 minutes of ice time per game.

In 293 career NHL games, the speedy Gregor, a fourth-round draft pick by the Sharks in 2016, has 70 points, with 52 of those coming with San Jose.

The Sharks still have several pending RFAs with arbitration rights, including forwards Nikolai Kovalenko, Thomas Bordeleau, and goalies Georgi Romanov and Gabriel Carriere.

The camp of one pending RFA without arb rights, Danil Gushchin, expects to get a qualifying offer from the Sharks, while another RFA, Klim Kostin, reportedly will not. Any RFA that does not receive a qualifying offer by Monday afternoon will become a UFA.