Thornton agrees to one-year deal to stay in San Jose

Not long after Patrick Marleau inked a one-year contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs Sunday, Joe Thornton put pen to paper on a one-year contract worth $8 million, ensuring that he will remain a Shark at least through the 2017-18 season.

“Ultimately, I wanted to stay in San Jose, that’s why I signed here,” Thornton said. “I feel like a Shark. It was a fun process, but I’m coming back.”

During the season, news reports revealed that Thornton was looking for a three-year deal this summer, an ask that may have been compromised when he suffered an ACL/MCL tear in his left knee on April 2.

Thornton, who underwent surgery on his later in the month, eventually settled on a one-year contract that will give him $1.25 million more than the annual average salary ($6.75) he received in the three-year deal he signed with the club on Jan. 24, 2014.

“One year works at this point in my career,” Thornton said. “We’re going to go year by year and see how I feel. I feel like I’ve got a lot left in the tank and, hopefully after this deal, I’ll keep signing.”

Thornton said he expects to be, “100 percent” by the time the 2017-18 season kicks off at the SAP Center on Oct. 4. The veteran forward, who turned 38 on Sunday, said he’s expecting to start skating in about two weeks.

According to TSN’s Pierre LeBrun, Thornton received phone calls from 17 different teams acquiring about his services last week.

“It was nice getting courted by all these teams and I felt bad saying, hey, I’m going back to San Jose,” Thornton said. “But that’s where my heart is and that’s where I’m happy.”