Keith Ballard Is Worth $4.2 Million If He Gets Used On The Power Play

[B_a_M]

Ballard hasn't been used properly right from the get go, while other dman made mistakes over and over they never had their ice time cut in half. Ballard makes one mistake he rides the bench then the next game he is up in the press box. While his first season he was battling injuries and did come into camp over weight, he was in AV dog house every step of the season. I believe Ballard could be used in the top 4 pairing, after all Bieksa is one of the Dman that make countless mistakes.

[ABurrows14]

It's entirely true.

Ballard didn't suddenly go from being capable of playing 20+ minutes per game with regular PP time, to being unusable in the span of a summer.

A coach needs to give a player the opportunity to do what he has done throughout his career, to be successful. AV gave Ballard 10 minutes of PP time in an entire season... of course Rome got more...

Ballard is perfect for being used on the 3rd pair while getting PP time (and PK as he is a huge shot blocker). If he is actually given the real opportunity, we'll see ballard play the way he did everywhere else, BEFORE getting coached into a mess by AV...

[alldaynucksfan11]

i would rather have him on the pp than bieksa. all bieksa does is take a wrist shot lol

[Butters Stoch]

Maybe on another team but I just don't see him playing like he's worth 4.2 for us.

[yogolol]

i would rather have him on the pp than bieksa. all bieksa does is take a wrist shot lol

[Pears]

i would rather have him on the pp than bieksa. all bieksa does is take a wrist shot lol

[Go Faulk Yourself]

dear keith ballard lovers.....you are insane!

keith ballard has a terrible point shot and can't hit the net. he is incapable of playing the power play.

keith ballard had the worst shooting percentage on the entire canucks roster last season:

2011-2012 - Regular Season - Vancouver Canucks - Skater - Summary - Points Player Team Pos GP G A P +/- PIM PP SH GW OT S S% TOI/G Sft/G FO%

1-29 of 29 results.

1

1 Henrik Sedin VAN C 82 14 67 81 +23 52 8 0 6 0 113 12.4 19:05 24.8 50.1 2 Daniel Sedin VAN L 72 30 37 67 +14 40 10 0 6 2 229 13.1 18:48 25.0 31.6 3 Alexandre Burrows VAN L 80 28 24 52 +24 90 3 2 7 0 198 14.1 18:28 25.8 35.0 4 Ryan Kesler VAN C 77 22 27 49 +11 56 8 1 1 0 222 9.9 20:05 25.8 53.6 5 Alexander Edler VAN D 82 11 38 49 +0 34 5 1 0 0 228 4.8 23:51 28.9 0.0 6 Kevin Bieksa VAN D 78 8 36 44 +12 94 2 0 2 0 166 4.8 23:38 28.2 0.0 7 Chris Higgins VAN L 71 18 25 43 +11 16 1 1 4 2 165 10.9 16:18 23.5 40.0 8 Jannik Hansen VAN R 82 16 23 39 +18 34 0 1 1 0 137 11.7 14:53 22.3 41.4 9 Dan Hamhuis VAN D 82 4 33 37 +29 46 1 0 0 0 140 2.9 23:25 28.8 0.0 10 David Booth FLA, VAN L 62 16 14 30 -5 34 3 0 1 0 159 10.1 14:55 20.7 50.0 11 Sami Salo VAN D 69 9 16 25 +7 10 7 0 3 1 136 6.6 20:26 27.8 0.0 12 Mason Raymond VAN L 55 10 10 20 +4 18 1 1 2 0 125 8.0 15:35 22.2 28.0 13 Maxim Lapierre VAN C 82 9 10 19 -3 130 0 0 0 0 103 8.7 11:13 17.6 52.1 14 Manny Malhotra VAN C 78 7 11 18 -11 14 0 0 2 0 60 11.7 12:20 20.9 58.5 15 Samuel Pahlsson CBJ, VAN C 80 4 13 17 -2 34 0 1 1 0 93 4.3 14:46 21.4 52.6 16 Marc-Andre Gragnani BUF, VAN D 58 2 13 15 +6 26 1 0 0 0 47 4.3 16:08 21.0 100.0 17 Aaron Rome VAN D 43 4 6 10 -4 46 1 0 1 0 42 9.5 15:13 20.3 0.0 18 Zack Kassian BUF, VAN R 44 4 6 10 -2 51 0 0 0 0 54 7.4 11:17 15.0 47.8 19 Dale Weise VAN R 68 4 4 8 -1 81 0 0 0 0 48 8.3 8:09 13.2 0.0 20 Keith Ballard VAN D 47 1 6 7 +0 64 0 0 0 0 41 2.4 15:33 21.4 0.0 21 Andrew Ebbett VAN C 18 5 1 6 +2 6 1 0 2 2 27 18.5 9:35 14.6 53.6 22 Byron Bitz VAN R 10 1 3 4 +2 14 0 0 0 0 6 16.7 10:29 17.4 0.0 23 Andrew Alberts VAN D 44 2 1 3 +4 40 0 0 2 0 19 10.5 14:17 19.7 0.0 24 Christopher Tanev VAN D 25 0 2 2 +10 2 0 0 0 0 15 0.0 16:43 22.4 0.0 25 Mike Duco VAN R 6 0 2 2 +1 5 0 0 0 0 4 0.0 8:03 13.2 0.0 26 Aaron Volpatti VAN L 23 1 0 1 -2 37 0 0 0 0 17 5.9 8:58 13.6 100.0 27 Mark Mancari VAN R 6 0 0 0 +0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0.0 8:18 13.0 0.0 28 Bill Sweatt VAN L 2 0 0 0 +0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0.0 5:20 9.0 0.0 29 Victor Oreskovich VAN R 1 0 0 0 +0 7 0 0 0 0 0 0.0 6:17 9.0 0.0

[billabong]

Rome got some powerplay time because after coming back from the injury he was scoring goals like never before (something like 3 goals in 4 games) I would say Rome earned his powerplay time. What has Ballard ever done to earn powerplay time? Yah he was good on other teams but that was on other teams. Ballard has 14 points in 112 games with the Canucks, he has not earned powerplay time. Now I don't mean to sound like I'm hating on the guy, I hope we keep him and he can prove me wrong but for right now if I was AV I would put Hamhuis on the powerplay (who had 37 points last as our top shutdown defenceman) over Ballard.

[Jai604]

It's entirely true.

Ballard didn't suddenly go from being capable of playing 20+ minutes per game with regular PP time, to being unusable in the span of a summer.

A coach needs to give a player the opportunity to do what he has done throughout his career, to be successful. AV gave Ballard 10 minutes of PP time in an entire season... of course Rome got more...

Ballard is perfect for being used on the 3rd pair while getting PP time (and PK as he is a huge shot blocker). If he is actually given the real opportunity, we'll see ballard play the way he did everywhere else, BEFORE getting coached into a mess by AV...

[luckylager]

Ballard is not worth $4.2m, end of story. He has been paid that for the last two seasons and by my math probably owes the Aqualini's about $6m just for sucking in his own end.

[The Architect]

[VanCityScout]

Que the Supertramp "Dreamer" song

[Grape]

Unfortunately, there are rumours he's going to Dallas.

[RyanKeslord17]

I wouldn't mind seeing this as the PP units:

Sedin-Sedin-Kesler

Garrison-Edler

Booth-Higgins-Doan

Bieksa-Ballard

[Salmonberries]

As it happens, we have the only man in the hockey industry that doesn't think that Keith Ballard can play the point on the power play as our head coach.

Alain Vigneault.

Alain has never used Ballard on the powerplay and he never will. Alain believes that Aaron Rome is better suited to the role than Ballard. Of course, Alain is insane, but he is the coach, now and forever.

But yes, it is very frustrating, isn't it?

[thehamburglar]

Hope he does get a bigger role here.

[cmpunk]

I been saying it since day 1. Ballard is a top 4 guy that can play big hard minutes and is the type of d-man every team wants during the playoffs. There is a reason he was used in all situations on other teams and playing over 20 minutes a night, and this all lead to him getting 4.2mil.

Day 1 we got Bally, I thought him and Hamhuis would be our top shutdown pairing. Boy was I wrong. I still belive that if Ballard is used properly is worth his contract. If he his traded to another team, he will be a top d man.

[cmpunk]

Ballard is probably the best skater on our team and one of the best skating defensemen in the NHL, skates like the wind.

[Fozzy]

Ballard is not worth $4.2m, end of story. He has been paid that for the last two seasons and by my math probably owes the Aqualini's about $6m just for sucking in his own end.

[nuck nit]

What nobody is offering up is his injury history.Nobody talks about it and many diss Ballard without even mentioning it.

Gillis and the .org brought Ballard in here after his SECOND hip surgery.They gave Florida two first rounders in Grabner and Howden and we got a salary dump and Oreo bye bye.Florida dumped a lot of salary in a severely injured Ballard.Bernier is still a serviceable NHL third/ fourth liner.

Gillis.org felt so compelled to acquire Ballard they gave up on Grabner and also gave up a future first round top pick.In retrospect it appears they failed miserably but it was Ballard's injuries that made the Gillis.org deal look worse than what Ballard can provide for any team.

The second hip surgery really set Ballard back.He struggled into camp,through camp and into the regular season.

Four games in as a Canuck Ballard suffered a serious concussion.

Still,Ballard came back what appears to be very prematurely and his poor game play reflected his cognitive disabilities.Having suffered consecutive concussions myself I place the blame squarely on the Canucks medical staff for allowing Ballard to return to play far too quickly.

Then Ballard suffered his third setback within months -sprained MCL.His first year as a Canuck was a complete write off.

Last year Ballard started well even though he received limited minutes but suffered a back injury in October .

In February of this year Ballard suffered two more head injuries and yet continued to play as he went un/misdiagnosed and played on with yet another concussion.

Ballard's play before and after the second concussion was effective.

His play was even inspirational at times,throwing his patented hip checks and being involved in four fights,two of the sensational variety.

Again,the Canucks .org misdiagnosed his second concussion and in his condition should have never been put in a position of taking punches to the head yet there are precious few players on this team that defend their team mates,like Ballard will and does.The exceptions are Lappy and Alberts. Bieksa is a throw in as he picks his spots and far more has always been expected of him.

Ballard's tenure here has been unfortunate as he came in injured and then suffered further consecutive,serious injuries,coupled with terrible timing.

Now that he is injury free and should be healthier I believe this should be Ballard's best ever year as a Canuck.

Ballard is an above average NHL d man with explosive speed,excellent positioning and is a throw back to the d men of old-hard hitting and a defender of his mates.

Very few Canucks display his courage and heart.I would not get rid of Ballard unless the payback is overly sufficient.

This organisation needs more heart and soul and employing those players like Ballard that are willing to cover for their mates and can dish it out and take it like a real pro are hard to find ,never mind acquire.

No whining,no diving,no complaining,no cheap shots.Hits hard,plays positionally excellent,fighter ,covers his mates backs.Clone this guy.