Lafleurs Guy
Guuuuuuuy!
- Jul 20, 2007
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The reason I’m worried is because I’d like to see us win a cup in my lifetime. A 30 goalscorer is good. If he’s consistent around that level he’s a decent second liner. But that’s not what we need him to be.I'm of the opinion that Cole Caufield started feeling a lot more confident with his shoulder towards the end of last season.
He was was engaging in physical contact not just absorbing it.
There is a huge difference.
Having said that I expect a return to normal in terms of his shooting regimen.
Players who rely on a certain weapon don't just assume it will remain elite they work on it.
How much was Cole able to work on his shot last season?
My guess is probably not nearly enough.
The reason you are worried is because you put him so high up on a pedestal and expect so much out of him.
If his numbers stay the same you have your reasoning worked out in advance.
Last season we were told it will take a full season to fully recover and that's why he couldn't find the back of the net.
Now we read that it may be as much as three years?
I'll stick to the bold text.
Moreover, I completely disagree with your assessment that his style of play changed throughout the year. And the numbers don’t support you on this either. There may have been short stretches where that happened but by and large he consistently put up the same metrics at the beginning of the year as he did at the end. The only difference was finishing. Twice he caught fire separated by a twenty something game goalless streak.
So yeah, if you aren’t paying attention to what he’s actually doing you’ll say ‘hey he was better later on’ but the underlying numbers are pretty consistent throughout the year. He had tons of chances but couldn’t convert. But he still put up 300+ shots. Still had tons of chances from in close. That was consistent for almost the whole year.
The biggest difference was shooting from mid ice. That dropped by like 75-80 percent. Absolutely putrid.
If he stays like that… it’s a blow to us winning cups. If he goes back to close to what he was, then we can probably put together two lines that are number one quality. It’s a big differences.
I couldn’t care less about putting stock in a player or not. You revise as they develop that’s how it works. I saw CC as a legit potential superstar. Now I have to revise downward from his injury. And until he proves otherwise, I have to view him as a second liner. I’m hopeful he can recover and there’s reason to believe he can. But we have to wait and see. Right now, he’s not the blue chip player I see him as before. There’s risk that’s been introduced into the equation that wasn’t there before.
Adding Demidov helps to de-risk any issues with CC. if CC were to not improve Demidov can pick up that slack. But I’d much rather have two top scorers than one. If CC returns to form and Demidov pans out? I’d say we become contenders pretty quickly. It makes a huge difference.
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