This was followed by Chayka quotes wherein he weighed the pros and cons of SEL (mental and emotional comfort) vs AHL (adapting to NA ice and game style). He said that they’ll all work together to come up with the best game plan for Victor and they are not going to dismiss his personal comfort in the evaluation. Chayka wants to be very careful with this kid. It was encouraging to read. He hasn’t lost sight of the fact that they drafted a human. And that Soderstrom’s soft skills were a big part of the equation. They won’t damage him.
Contrary to belief that any player brought in will be damaged beyond repair to the point where we have to trade them? Even though there may have been players that were not specifically drafted by Chayka, he still has to take ownership of developing them. Fortunately, it appears that in the past 4 drafts, we have taken players who appear to be very heavily self-motivated and looking to improve on their own internal knowledge of what needs to be improved.
I never once ever felt as if though I had to question the work ethic of any one of POJ, Chychrun, Keller, Soderstrom, or Hayton, especially with the fact that they will use that to continue to see their skill rise.