GDT: Anaheim @ San Jose, 7pm Pacific

[Zegs2sendhelp]

He has fewer defensive responsibilities at wing, but is less engaged on both ends of the ice. He is a natural center, best with the puck in the middle of the ice. I'd like them to play him at center, with less difficult defensive matchups.

Idk what you do with zegras anymore…. But he def doesn’t have the same swagger on the ice that he did his first 2 years

 

[Deuce22]

Idk what you do with zegras anymore…. But he def doesn’t have the same swagger on the ice that he did his first 2 years

No question. In an effort to make him more responsible defensively, they've clipped his wings a bit. It's now up to Zegras to find the sweet spot where he creates, but is still playable in his own end.

 

[Static]

Zegras must looks like he has lost confidence.

 

[Hockey Duckie]

Zegras must looks like he has lost confidence.

I don't think confidence is something Z ever loses, but it's how he is being used. Maybe he needs a quarter or half the season to process things defensively to make it more automatic to his game like his offense. It doesn't help that Z was put at LW in one game, C with AHLers the next game, and RW in this last game.

 

[The Midnight Burrito]

They're literally coaching the offense out of him in the name of "defensive responsibility". A man can do both.

As an aside, this is why I've always balked when people keep saying they want to see Z develop as a center. I don't think that's a good use of his abilities. He's such an offensive dynamo when he's mostly freed from big defensive responsibilities that any offensive-minded coach would have penciled him to a winger role and gotten a more defensively responsible center for him just to allow him to shine doing what he's the best at.

I think the coaches would say that it’s up to him to figure that out. I guess it’ll be a process but this seems like a pretty silly use of a powerful offensive weapon.