Gurn Posted February 17, 2019 Share Posted February 17, 2019 6 hours ago, Kanukfanatic said: I'm no quitter!! you might not be, but your liver on the other hand... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boudrias Posted February 17, 2019 Share Posted February 17, 2019 On 2/15/2019 at 12:22 PM, oldnews said: I always liked him as well - in spite of the fact it seemed clear that he had some problems. A person can grow up a lot in 4 years - particularly through that stage of their life - a lot of us don't grow our brains until we're 25... Zack can skate, he's relatively fearless, he has really good hands for a big guy - and some good vision (he used to make some really impressive passes in his time here). He's also grown into a role where he gets 39% ozone starts (has pretty good 'possession' numbers in those minutes = 49.3% corsi) and is 4th among Oiler forwards in PK minutes this year - so he's a frequent part of one of their two pk units. 8 goals is also not bad in that context - would tie him for 7th on this team. Is he ever going to be the player that Buffalo or Vancouver hoped he'd become? Maybe not - but he's developed into a pretty serviceable depth forward that makes any team harder to play against - and he's engaged in making himself a more complete, mindful player without the puck (and was never as bad as some people around here perceived....they tend to judge hockey intelligence by the look on a player's face - and sandbag young guys like Kassian - or Virtanen, ironically, who is also quite a mindful player without the puck). Anyhow - would we spend much to bring Kassian over? = no - but if there's a reasonable depth hockey trade to be made, I'd make Gagner a Coiler again in a heartbeat - particularly with the M.A.S.H. ghosts preying on this team again. Do we "need" Kassian = probably not - we have fairly good, serviceable depth like Gaudette, MacEwen, Kero, Gaunce, etc at the AHL level to call up - but if we could swap out a contract for him....and none of our forwards quite bring the heaviness/intimidation factor that Kassian can. We have some youth at the top of the lineup that could be served well by a heavy forward in the lineup (I love MacEwen, but he's not quite that - at least not yet). Kassian is another one of these kids that were brought up to the NHL to quickly for their emotional well being. He had a tough time growing up with his father gone. His emotional background cried for some kind of treatment. The fact that he is still playing in the NHL is a testament to his underlying character IMO. I would take Zach back but I doubt Hitch would give him up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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