The Michael Misa Fan Club (Those who have been endeared)
My best explanation of the MM77 Extended Universe which is in no way a complete guide or exactly helpful in any way.
Sam Dickinson
Samisa! This is definitely not a primer to their relationship, or to any of Misa’s relationships with the following people, but I will do my best to give them an introduction and explanation of their dynamic. Sam and Misa have this little red string that’s been curled around them forever. They’ve played against each other on almost every team they’ve ever been a part of, most famously being Dickie’s London Knights and Misa’s Saginaw Spirit in the OHL. Sam was coincidentally on the ice when Misa broke his tibia his first season with the Spirit, he’s there, lingering, and covering the camera where Misa is writhing around in pain. Even when he shuffles away to the Knights, he’s looking back to see Misa, a guy at this point he’s only sort of friends with. In the famous Samisa Never Offside Podcast, Sam and Misa talked about how they knew each other since they were little kids and became friends around 14/15 (which would have been when Misa was granted exceptional status for the OHL), bonding slightly over the fact they had the same agent. This is also where Misa’s “I like Dick” quote comes from, saying that he didn’t like anyone on the London Knights but Sam. The quote is definitely funny but the meaning behind it is one Misa has kept up, he likes Sam, Sam is good to him, he likes him. More on the Samisa dynamic from the podcast here.
By all means, Sam and Misa were supposed to have that classic hate-filled rivalry but they just couldn’t seem to manage that. On the ice, people would be chirping each other and Sam and Misa would just skate by and laugh. Perhaps similarly to the tibia incident, Misa was also present for one of the lowest moments of Sam’s hockey career at the time, losing the Memorial Cup in 2024. The London Knights originally knocked the Spirit out of the running but because they were the host team, they already had an automatic bid in. The Spirit ended up making it to the finals against the Knights where they won by one, a heartbreak defeat. Dickie was crushed and he still seems vaguely sour over it on the podcast, but the friendship prevails!
At the sharks Samisa get even closer, and continue to make crazy heart eyes at each other that I would be remiss to not include. They bicker FREQUENTLY, and despite it all, Sam seems to soften the chirps and abrasive attitude when it comes to Misa. I am only being vaguely less objective when I say that Sam knows that Misa can’t chirp, and that he’s a little too genuine, and that he doesn’t always know when he’s being chirped, so Sam stays right at Misa’s level with it. At his core, Sam is an entertainer and it’s no fun if your audience isn’t enjoying themselves when you start running your bits, so in this case, Sam softens and yet he also has full reign to do what he wants because Misa will laugh anyways, even if he’s being bullied. Misa likes the pushing around, and he likes having Sam around in general because according to Cat Toffoli, Sam basically lives with them. And if you want to listen to Toff, and his vague fatherly vendetta against Sam, the Samisa bullying is constant and annoying, but when it comes down to it, Sam is also the one taking care of Misa (if we can ignore the weird incesteous Sam/Toff/Misa of this clip that Toff is trying to spin… more on that later). The care and authority Sam takes on for Misa is actually always lingering, it’s Misa looking to Sam to know how a hotel phone works because “You’re a smart guy”, it’s Sam setting the alarms for them, it’s Sam getting them places on time, it’s Misa looking to Sam to answer before him or for him. Misa has full faith in him and expects that Sam will know, Sam will figure it out, Sam has it under control for me. THIS is critical to their dynamic.
Even in the early Shark days, Sam takes it upon himself to make sure Misa is taken care of. When asked about his own housing accommodations (which ended with him living by himself), he said it was important for Misa to stay with the Toffolis, have the billet experience, because he was the younger one. Although, I suppose you could also take this in a begrudging way, Sam letting Misa have it not out of the good of his heart but out of obligation. And yet when that rolled back around it was Misa who invited Sam over to eat “family dinner” at the Toffolis because he didn’t want him to be lonely.
Igor Chernyshov
There is already a beautiful actual primer by @melonkai that I will not even attempt to replicate, go read it! But I am obligated to mention that Cherny and Misa played on the Saginaw Spirit together briefly back in 2024-2025 when Cherny came through the CHL import draft. And of course, now they play on the Sharks together! On the Spirit they had trouble communicating due to the language barrier but from interview clips that seems to be less of a problem now. Nowadays, you can find Cherny trailing his hand down Misa’s whole body, or Misa petting an angry Cherny, or them just being giggly on the bench while Toff stares out into space.
Zayne Parekh
Parekh and Misa played together back in Saginaw under the Saginaw Spirit from 2022-2025, although Parekh is almost exactly a year older than Misa and went ninth in the 2024 NHL draft to the Calgary Flames. He still plays for them alongside Michael’s older brother, Luke Misa. Michael and Zayne have actually played on multiple teams together growing up, including on Team Canada for World Juniors 2026, and the Hlikna Gretzky Cup 2023 team (w/ Dickinson and Spence) where they won gold! The two of them are pretty close, having their own uh… intimate pre-game rituals which for some reason include Misa holding his stick out for Zayne to either jerk, or lick; No, I am not joking. Honestly, the narratives aren’t crazy here but they’re just very clearly good friends and have been for awhile. They feature each other semi heavily on their instagrams, and Zayne seems to like to comment a lot lmao.
Even on different teams now, they’re still friends! In my own opinion, Zayne Parekh might be too cool for Misa but that’s okay, and it only helps to serve the unfortunately endeared narrative I’m trying to spin here. They’re #parisa to me, if anyone cares.
Malcolm Spence
Currently, Spence plays for UMich but he was drafted 43rd overall by the New York Rangers in 2025 (same draft class as Misa). Previously, Spence and Misa played on the Mississauga Senators youth hockey team together, and since they were little kids. They played on different teams in the OHL, and were drafted back to back in 2022 (Misa with exceptional status, Spence was 16 at the time), but remained close friends. They played on the same team again for the Hlinka Gretzky Cup alongside Parekh and Dickinson. There’s probably something to be said about a clip from the Canada Finland game where Misa gets put in a headlock and Spence is the first on the scene while Dickie crosses half the rink to put the offending Finland player in his own headlock… Interesting narratives there. The day one vs the inevitable NHL teammate you have a long red string of fate with…
And although I’m not sure the context behind it, Spence and Misa were roommates at some point? Spence specifically refers to Misa as his roommate during the NHL Combine when he leaks that Misa wants to go to the Sharks, and there’s some vague instagram comments I stumbled upon about it, so probably road roommates for when they played together as well as the combine!
Collin Graf
Quiet guys who stick together are quiet guys who stay together, I don’t know. Both Graf and Misa are more soft spoken/reserved/introverted guys on the Sharks and perhaps for that reason they’ve gotten close. This is a cutieful introduction to their relationship that I fully endorse. They stick together and linger around with their occasional chats and mostly blank staring, which I’m a big fan of. I’m not exactly sure what Drew means when he says they sit together, but we can infer that it’s a common occurrence for them to be next to one another, on the bench, in the locker room, on picture day, on the bus, etc, etc. In a locker room and team full of big personalities, I can imagine it’s nice to find someone who can go your speed whenever you want, not everyone needs to be jumping off the walls. Funny enough, it seems like Misa gets more talkative when Graf is around, starting up his own conversations instead of waiting for someone else to. And of course, shout out to Misa saying “Because he’s a smart guy!” about Graf being a good possible emergency ref, he really is the sincerest guy around.
William Eklund
I don’t have that much for this one but it’s still important for me to note. In an interview clip, Ekky mentions that he sees Misa as a little brother to him. Honestly he has some pretty thoughtful commentary on it that is very sweet, he wants to be there for him and apparently they hang out a lot. William Eklund, you too are endeared by Michael Misa, welcome to the club. Most of Ekky’s mic’d up game is just him yelling at Misa who says zero words back which is nice, like real siblings lmao. You can tell Ekky does take the “under my wing” roll very seriously with Misa, as they’re looking at the IPad on the bench or he’s straight up hollering at Misa on the ice.
Tyler & Cat Toffoli
Billet parents of all time. Originally I wasn't going to put them on here because I thought it was self explanatory but it would feel too much like a major oversight on my part. While Toff does think Misa needs to grow up a little and not be so messy, he’s also the same guy who’s volunteering himself to get in between the Samisa bullying, and to take care of Misa in general. He’s the ultimate fond exasperated father figure that I also have to unfortunately mention said one weird incest-lite comment about Sam and him being Misa’s fathers. I’ll leave that to the masses to digest. Every photo that Cat posts of Toff and Misa are of the ducking following his mama variety, ex. them not watching TV together, them walking into games, them going to football games, them in the car, etc. This little parental dynamic goes as far as Toff literally referring to Misa as his and Cat’s child when Misa blabbed about what was supposed to be a surprise get together for Toff after a game. They also had matching family halloween costumes so that's cute!
On Cat specifics for this, she just seems to be very sweet on Misa in general, saying things like he’s a nice kid. Similar to Dickie where he softens around Misa, Cat is also quick to reassure Misa (although she does the same for everyone else too, cool lady indeed), my primary example of this being when Misa gets vaguely insecure about being loud and both Cat and Sam jump to say it’s not a bad thing. And of course there is the famous (to me) moment where Cat upon returning home goes to greet Stella, her dog, by saying “Hi, baby!” in a puppy voice and Misa completely responds with “Hey.” That guy is her baby too, I guess.
Possible Nick Lardis
To me, even Nick Lardis gets a mention for the #OakvilleBoys of it all. They’ve never played together and I’m not sure if Lardis is more of a Luke Misa friend than a Michael Misa friend but he’s around nonetheless. They were training and doing lame instagram ads together this offseason so there’s that. He is also supposed to be a part of the Vancouver Macklin Celebrini training camp this summer which as of the time of posting this hasn’t happened yet. Perhaps more is to be revealed about Nick Lardis and the Misas, or he’ll be found dead on the Grouse Grind trail after having to deal with Willmack and Samisa for two weeks. Time will tell!
Honorable Mentions:
The general Ontario hockey boys friend group, specifically, Spence, Misa, Parekh and some other guys like Nic Sima. Yadda, yadda, Canada boys stick together, a lot of them played for the Spirit, or the Senators in minors, blah, blah, they take summer lake trips, okay, whatever.
This one specific comment on Misa’s instagram from Porter Martone which I accidentally walked in on…
They were teammates on Canada’s Red team for World U-17 and well, I guess they connected lmao. I shall reserve any judgement because they were like 15/16 at the time but it’s funny to put in here anyways. Hockey guy instagram comments will always be famous to me!
Honestly I could have put any of the Sharks here (even including Will Smith Hockey and the mostly joking WillMisa blood feud) and it would have worked but I digress. Macklin can get an honorable mention though because the little back pats I’m always seeing are cute.
