The last line of your reply reminds me of a conversation I had a long time ago with
@MS about if the canucks should have made room for Frankie Corrado. At the time I was taking your point of view. However you can’t always do that. Especially with first round picks. They get so much leeway to make the team, when they don’t it’s because they aren’t worth it.
I was thinking of the Corrado situation when I wrote that but there was a clear #6/#7 spot for him but Hutton's surprising play changed things. Corrado was suppose to be NHL ready at the time but IIRC he was even outplayed by even Biega. Regardless, that was a player the Canucks had making the team and when he didn't the Canucks tried to trade him and couldn't and then tried to sneak him through waivers and failed. I think there were moves that Benning could have made to keep Corrado and that was a source of anger among the fan base when he was lost to waivers. I do think there's a difference between making room for a younger player to make the team and ultimately waiving that young player when the young player failed to step up.
Last year at every point PDG played ahead of Pods… like that’s just a fact, even when he reverted… he was still played ahead of Pods.
So what? PDG was playing ahead of a lot of guys. At one point he was averaging more ES minutes than Petey. Is he really the difference between the Canucks contending and not contending? JR prior to last season said he prefers a retool to a rebuild: "I’d prefer to get younger NHL players that maybe didn’t work out in their entry-level contract and, you know, bring them in and give them a second chance." Allvin this past summer has talked about wanting to be a faster team. Pods is faster and younger and PDG has a limited NHL future. That's just a fact.
And yeah you have to earn the coaches trust… see Kure for what happens otherwise.
You have to develop players, and Pods had absolutely stagnated for 2 seasons. Now if you want to argue that was the Canucks fault for bad development… sure I can hear that.
Again oilers fans like him because he is rutable good kid, stands up for teammates, hits… that doesn’t mean he is good…
Podkolzin has a 30 point pace stappled to Drai's hip. If he was playing in our bottom-6 he'd be producing nothing, just like he'd done every other season after his rookie year.
Look at what the Kings did. They lost Lizotte and signed Turcotte to a deal that would make teams think twice about picking him up if he wasn't NHL-calibre. One of the players Turcotte had to beat was Studnicka (i.e. there was a legitimate chance for him to win a spot).
PDG at one point went 26 games without a single point and finished with 5 goals and 10 points despite some top 6 minutes. Let's not pretend that PDG is somehow so much better offensively than Pods that it makes a difference.
You're right, Podkolzin does not provide the utility of PDG because he doesn't PK. Conversely, he has an offensive upside PDG does not provide.
But when you're on a 9 point pace in your 23 year old season, the offensive upside is really hard to see.
I think they should have kept Podkolzin because there was no future in PDG/Sprong, but I can understand why they walked away.
I think PDG's PK utility is overrated in the grand scheme of things. Last season, Bluegar, Joshua, and Aman (when he was in the lineup) were all ahead of PDG. Suter and Petey too in the regular season (with Miller being close). We lost Lindholm but we signed Sherwood, Heinan, and Debrusk who all have PK utility.
Keep in mind that it's not like PDG was known for his penalty killing prior to joining the Canucks. I'm not aware of PDG being some sort of elite penalty killer over what the Canucks have.
He doesn't read the game good enough to fit into the sea of PDG's style that Tocchet plays
I think he does. Pods' issue is he has a tendency to lose confidence and overthink the game. In past comments, Tocchet doesn't talk about Pods needing to read the play better in terms of ability. He talked about Pods needing to play more recklessly and not overthink things.
