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Ray_Cathode

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Everything posted by Ray_Cathode

  1. The first time Rathbone was brought up he graduated and played 8 games and had 1g 2a in limited time - but looked very good. The second time was at the beginning of Green’s last year when the whole team was playing like crap - hardly got any playing time, got sent down to Abby and tore up the AHL. The last time he was brought was the beginning of this year when the team played like crap under Boudreau, again, hardly got any minutes, but in his deployment on the second pp unit - 20 to 30 second shots, he showed he could run a power play.. Got sent down and got hurt. To say he has been given multiple shots is a stretch. He had the misfortune to come up both times when the D on this team had no defensive structure whatsoever. Both Green and Boudreau felt they had enough small defencemen with Hughes. Now that Wolanin is up, and Rathbone is healthy, he will impress again in Abby - even though most of the best of the Abby team is playing in Vancouver. Neither Boudreau nor Green employed any recognizable defensive structure and that prevented any of our young D from showing much. As has been shown under Tocchet and Foote, when playing structured hockey, the young D has played fine. We have just played three strong teams while deploying Wolanin, Brisebois and Juulson and won two of those games and took the best team in the league to a 3-1 game (the last goal was an empty net).
  2. On top of that, he’s hurt. This trade has the danger of becoming a Jim Benning trade like when he acquired Ferland and Baertschi - two guys that brought their health problems with them. If the NYI pick ends up at 13 or 14, there is a great RHD prospect sitting right there in this draft, Alex Pellikka, who won’t cost us 6 mil plus after next year. Sure hope this guy’s injury is not lingering, and especially not a concussion, and I also hope we have cleared the required cap space when it comes to re-signing him year after next. Other than that, he looks like a good player, brings a lot of offence (though more than half hi# points are on the pp) since Hughes has first D spot on the pp, expect Hronek’s pp production to largely disappear - unless we decide to include two D on the first unit. Looks like Filipino is a better shooter than Hughes. Though we have partly overcome the lack of a shot from the blue line by rotating Pettersson into the high middle near the blue line to take that 103 mph slap-shot.
  3. Didn’t that bunch just take the best team in the league to the wire, and beat Nashville and Dallas? Can’t imagine why you’re in love with OEL and Myers, or is Bear the other guy you like? Maybe the Canucks D was undervalued because of poor coaching in the past - I mean, other than OEL, who would be a disaster anywhere - just riding out his massive contract to the last buck.
  4. So you don’t like OEL, Myers and Stillman, who was the other guy?
  5. The more I look at this trade the more I like it. The ability to score lots of shorties indicates strong skating, great reads and very good anticipation- those attributes go a long way toward yielding a future nhler. Adding size to that makes me think Mikheyev 2, if we can develop him properly. The way the current Abby coaches are developing our prospects adds some confidence that we just might have a future nhler. One of the knocks on Lockwood, was his size and injury history from playing a robust game. There were many games in Abby where he was the best player on the ice, and at last at that level he had pretty good offensive skills, he is still a guy who could one day stick in the league. We did give up a value in this player, and I wish Lockwood all the best. We did not get something for nothing, we got something for something.
  6. Most wingers playing pk are in roles indistinguishable from centres, they also tend to be committed, talented defensive players. Add in the ability to take faceoffs and you have your basic utility guy like Lazar or Motte.
  7. Looking forward to those game/player reports. We finally have a few guys to monitor in the OHL - it’s been a while. Care to share a link?
  8. Yeah, I’m in favor of trades that clear cap and give us something of promise in place of a player with no upside.
  9. Yep, having an experienced 20 year NHL veteran defenceman as a coach doesn’t hurt either in Foote. He looked really good in preseason (I thought he should have made the team). He has been well coached in Abby and earned a lot of responsibility. Now he is in a great situation to get the details. With Wolanin moved up, I suppose Rathbone is a natural to inherit his spot in Abby. I hope he can recover the game he brought when he first came up. I really like the way the Abby D have performed: Brisebois, Juulson, Wolanin, and with Bear out for a while, we might need to bring up another. Outstanding.
  10. You think any of those people close to the player ever read this crap? The first thing they are told is to ignore anything in social media - this is all for the benefit of fans. When I was forty or so, A friend’s old timer team was short a player, so he got me to come out for them. This is old timer’s non-contact hockey, right? The game wasn’t five minutes old when a fight broke out. I turned the guy beside me and said, “I thought this was old timer, no contact hockey? He never even turned to me and muttered, “They’re still waiting to be drafted.”;same here, except they’re still waiting to be scouts and GM’s and I’m as bad as anybody. It’s a way of being involved in games at a level you were never good enough to play Players and anybody associated with them knows to stay out of it, for them, it would be like having a party in a portajohn.
  11. After a rough first game in Abby, Martin just had a great game - basically stood on his head.
  12. Myers and Boeser were playing for the tank, experienced vets that they are. The young guys didn’t get the message, they still want nhl careers. But yeah, get it, and I want Bedard too, But it’s hard to keep my eyes on that prize when these guys are trying that hard.
  13. Thanks for the correction, I should have checked a pick calculator instead of the league wide points standing. I was guessing on Horvat’s pay check.
  14. Better pk without the OEL anchor… I mean boat anchor. Brisebois and Juulson featured on the pk?
  15. Players in the lineup tonight with time in Abby this year: Dries, Wolanin, Raty, Aman, Juulson, Podkolzin, Brisebois, was Silovs backup? Really speaks well of Colliton’s coaching team. On another topic: Horvat 11 GP 5g 3a 8 pts. Beauvillier 11GP 6g 5a 11PTS, Raty first point. 17;overall pick and we aren’t paying 8 mil a year. Good deal, so far.
  16. Kuzmenko per Ohn Garrett: Life is Beautiful! What a movie, what a player, what a goal!
  17. Yeah, Buying out Boeser or Garland would be senseless at this point, though I’m not sure there is much trade value in Boeser at this point - he is a rea dog defensively and doesn’t bring enough offensively to make up for it. I like Garland, he is all effort all the time. Interesting thought on the LTIR cap money, but wouldn’t that have to be a real long term injury, like with Ferland?
  18. I agree with this. If we played Hughes or Pettersson as enforcers, we would not see the best of them. For sure, we want them to play adequately defensively. Which they do. Another thing to consider as an example, is that Beauvillier has been very good for us offensively, but not for New York. When Kesler and Burroughs first came to z Vancouver, we played them primarily as defensive players and we didn’t get to see their complete game. Another factor is the context into which a player is thrust. When we first brought Rathbone into Vancouver he looked bright with promise under Green, then as the team’s play disintegrated, so did his play. We sent him to the minors and after a few games of adjustment, he became outstanding. Rathbone is essentially a lesser version of Hughes - small (not as small as Hughes), a very good skater (not as good as Hughes), he has a rocket of a shot (also unlike Hughes), they both are ultra fast thinkers on the attack. I watched a lot of Rathbone when he first came to Abby. The strength of his defensive play was that he would anticipate the attack and rapidly close down forwards timing his arrival with the puck. Not a big guy, but he would flatten bigger men because they never saw him coming - they were looking for the pass. Clearly, Green did not want him to play like that, if you remember Green’s defensive strategy was not about pressure, but about collapsing and giving ground. That does not play well with Rathbone’s game. Under Green he became very unsure and tentative, He needs to play as the player he was when he came to us. To succeed he has to play to his instinctual game. He has to go back to anticipation and attacking forwards when he is defending. That is the game that made him a highly rated prospect, at one point one of our best, and an AHL rookie of the year. He rarely got a chance on the PP when Hughes was injured- the primary role then was given to OEL. When he did get to quarterback the second unit, he was a very good puck mover in the few opportunities he got. Remember when Hughes came up? We gave him the pp. Rafferty was absolutely outstanding in the AHL, when we brought him up, we put him with the black aces under the protocol. He, like DiPietro, hardly played a game that season. We ruined both of them. We are in the process of doing the same with Rathbone. Like Hughes, you can’t put him out there to be a stud, though Rathbone is bigger and stronger than Hughes. We already had two offensive guys on the left side in Van, Hughes and OEL. Both Green and Boudreau (and likely Rutherford wanted a big, physical guy there, so we got Stillman). If OEL was not here, we could have had two puck movers on the D and still had a big guy to handle big forwards and net front on the pk. We can reclaim Rathbone, but it will require Colliton going back and watching game film from when Rathbone first came to Abby, because that is how Rathbone has to play to succeed. He doesn’t play like other D, he plays like Fox, the guy he played with in college. Another thing, Rathbone was not Benning’s guy, he was Brackett’s guy - JB told Bracket of Rathbone, “There, You got your guy!” Brackett did not leave in the best of circumstances between him and Benning. Vindictiveness is not unknown in the nhl. Sadly, I don’t think that will happen in the Zcanucks organization.. If he can get his game back at all, it will be elsewhere most likely. It is not an uncommon story in the NHL. Look at how quickly JB gave up on Forsling, he traded him for a song. Chicago at least played him, but he didn’t succeed until he got to Florida, where he blossomed. Another guy given up on by too organizations with scarcely a sniff, was another uncommon type of player - Grabner, who carved out quite a career as a pk specialist.
  19. Karlsson really protects the puck well, very clever player.
  20. Forsell really really tearing it up in the SHL. Nineteen years old. Amazing. I hope he comes to the prospects camp in the fall.
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