I'm a Bills fan, I said it somewhat jokingly in this thread/on this board earlier that I'm getting a lot of rookie year Josh Allen vibes out of watching Slafkovsky play and the parallels just keep getting stronger for me. I of course don't think that he has the same MVP contender and potentially era-defining superstar upside that Allen has reached, but the parallels are very striking to me as someone that watched an unfortunate amount of 2018 and 2019 Bills games.
Prospect Info: 2022 - 1st OA] Juraj Slafkovsky (LW) Part 4
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Egresch
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At least, we are over "Why couldn't he produce in Liiga" period
Yeah Josh Allen is a unicorn too. Awful completion % at Wyoming is somewhat similar to Slaf’s statline in the Liiga. The thing is you don’t see that often. If I were a NFL executive, i would not try to find the next Josh Allen in the sense that a guy with Allen’s issues in college will bust 9/10. Incredibly gutsy pick by Buffalo.
But yeah the similarity is there. Athletic freaks who are very raw
26Mats
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CHfan1
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Skip Bayless
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Slaf was just thinking too much about his positioning. Just use your instincts and try to disrupt without the puck kiddo, you'll be fine.
I think he's progressing at a good rate.
Kid has earned his stay so far. He is doing what is asked. Making plays, playing smart and taking incremental steps forward.
This entire staff has his best interests forefront and aren't worried about perception of fans or winning a game to save their azz.
Until he tails off I think he is where he should be, where he has earned to be and is being taken care of.
I trust this staffs vision for him.
From development, billeting, and knowing where he has the best op to progress. I think that's playing and just as important or more practice with NHL players daily n all the stuff that goes with it.
This entire staff has his best interests forefront and aren't worried about perception of fans or winning a game to save their azz.
Until he tails off I think he is where he should be, where he has earned to be and is being taken care of.
I trust this staffs vision for him.
From development, billeting, and knowing where he has the best op to progress. I think that's playing and just as important or more practice with NHL players daily n all the stuff that goes with it.
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Kennerback
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cphabs
The 2 stooges….
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Why? He’s on pace for 25 goals playing 11 minutes a night on “our” 3rd line… as an 18 year old.
Well said
Who, Slafkovsky? The guy that Martin Saint-Louis said today "sa progression est superbe"? Not ok, not barely enough, not everyone be patient, but SUPERB.
That guy???
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cphabs
The 2 stooges….
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Quite a shot as well. That was not “beginners” luck. He was waiting and pulled the trigger. Fantastic imo
Kennerback
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There’s stuff Slaf has not tried yet in the NHL. One thing he did last season was using his body to drive the net like Panarin did. Slaf could put that 238 pounds to good use.
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ChesterNimitz
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Lawrence "Play like a Pack of Mad Dogs" Taylor would be pleased. Slafkovsky's play against St. Louis provides an excellent glimpse of this kid's future. The Blues are a heavy team. A team that likes to lean on you. Intimidate you. The only way to beat a team like that is to have elite skill or to stand up to that physical intimidation and punch them in the nose. Slafkovsky played like a mad dog. He unhesitatingly when into the corners and along the boards to battle for loose pucks. He pushed back. He showed no fear. He gave as well as he took. He got knocked down and quickly got up with a smile that said: let's do that again. It's good to be 18, 6 feet 4 inches and weigh 240 pounds. He played like a Mad Dog and the Blues' players noticed. It was the Blues players that started to hesitate at the end of the game. With Slafkovsky and Xhekaj in the line up, Montreal will not be intimidated. Our skill players will have extra time and room.
This is a different Montreal team than your parent's Canadiens teams. The fans are noticing and soon all other teams in the league will start noticing. For that reason alone, Slafkovsky and Xhekaj have to be on the roster. We need those Mad Dogs.
People shouldn't beat up on fans who wanted him to start start somewhere else or eventually play somewhere else. I think MOST of us didn't expect the Habs to be as good as they have been. Instead expecting them to be still trying to win their 1st game right now.
Hins77
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I like his style of play. Always on the forechek, use his body, Good shot. He reminds me sometimes Radulov. I have always like the way he was playing.
The Buffalo Bills have had a steady stream of abject failures at QB interspersed with a few decent veteran stopgaps at the position and have been lost in the woods at QB since their last true #1 retired in the early 90s.
In 2018 after the latest reclamation project fizzled out, they traded up to pick Josh Allen at 7th overall. He's 6'5 240 and had generational freak-of-nature arm strength on draft day, and was seen as an effective running QB as well. The raw tools were absolutely off-the-charts impressive, and he had all the intangibles/personality characteristics you'd want in a star QB. However, he played in a mediocre college conference, put up mediocre stats, and had very poor throwing accuracy. Imagine if Slafkovsky had put up 45 points in 60 games in Junior A and was routinely flubbing breakout passes at that level yet still showing highlight reel flashes that convinced a team to take him in the top 10. It was widely seen as a desperate pick by a team dreaming on tools instead of making the safer choice to fill a team need with a less flashy player, and the conventional wisdom is/was that things like arm accuracy, processing speed, and decision-making weren't something you can teach a QB in the NFL. Sound familiar?
For the first 2 years of his career, the running game translated and he had a few exciting highlights where he flashed the big arm, but he played very poorly overall. He was basically a punchline to NFL fans and media for finishing near the very bottom in completion percentage/accuracy, throwing a ton of interceptions, and showing all the huge glaring red flags from college were still red flags despite the tools. However, you could still see he was such a raw player that left a glimmer of hope he could figure things out as there were still a lot of obvious technical deficiencies to fix, and the intangibles/personality really shone through with how he ran the ball aggressively and didn't shy away from contact. Then in his third season everything clicked and he broke out. He figured out the footwork, the team added an elite #1 receiver to support him, and Allen jumped from the bottom of the barrel to the top 5 in passing TDs, passing yards, and completion percentage, and was still in the top 3 in rushing TDs at QB. All the tools translated into a player that in his fifth season is now a freak of nature superstar widely considered to be the 1B to Mahomes with Mahomes/Allen in a tier of their own as the 2 best QBs in the NFL.
It's not an exact comparison, particularly as I certainly am not saying that Slafkovsky will have the same trajectory and break out as a superstar top 5 player in the league the way Allen has, but the parallels are pretty intriguing. Both are physical freaks that are/were still very raw in a ton of finer details but show eye popping flashes of skill despite a rocky initial adjustment to top level pro play. I think the intangibles side aligns well, there's a lot of comparisons between the two in terms of their confidence and at least hopefully their ability to handle a psycho local market and fanbase. Slafkovsky has the higher draft year production/floor projection than Allen did and is a fair bit more conventional, but there's a lot of parallels I see in terms of being ultra toolsy players that make/made a ton of easy mistakes early in their career and have a ton of room to grow because they're so raw.
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cphabs
The 2 stooges….
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River Meadow
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26Mats
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It's a real possibility that we won't be in it, if the young D and the goalies keep playing well. With eddy and Matheson coming back, and MSL maybe starting to figure out the lines, ... we'll see ...
JuJu Mobb
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Once he gains experience, he's going to be a pain in the ass on the forecheck with his long reach.
And getting meaner, faster, stronger, smarter. He’s an embryo of his potential. Pretty soon he’s taking over your home, your job, your girlfriend… Eating all the leftover chicken and leaving you scraps on the bones.
He needs to watch out he doesn’t start getting called for holding though, his free hand is a little grabby when he fights for pucks.
Skip Bayless
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Slaf will hit the wall at some point this season though. Y'all better not blame MSL for an 18 year who never played more than 11 games in a single year losing his energy in the world's fastest league.
I see a lot of posts suggesting that there’s no downside to him being sent down to the AHL…
Maybe that is the case, but that’s not a reason to send him down.
You want him playing wherever there’s opportunity to maximize his development.
Right now, based on how he’s responded over a small sample, he’s better off in the NHL than the AHL, at least imo.
That might change next month and if so, you re-evaluate.
Maybe that is the case, but that’s not a reason to send him down.
You want him playing wherever there’s opportunity to maximize his development.
Right now, based on how he’s responded over a small sample, he’s better off in the NHL than the AHL, at least imo.
That might change next month and if so, you re-evaluate.
Every player will.Slaf will hit the wall at some point this season though.
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