Again, you show your fundamental misunderstanding of these concepts and what's going on.
Yes, ANA wanted to limit Carlsson total games played so he could spend some time literally building his body in the gym and not getting broken down. But when he was in the lineup, he played a ton in all key situations. He wasn't blocked by anyone. They gave him the keys and let him have touches as the de facto 1C, 1PP, high leverage situations.
Majority of rookies coming into the league can't handle that at 18/19 years old. And most coaches are going to make their players earn that time and not be given the keys right away. The reason it was such a big deal was because it was such a different approach than how majority of teams handle young players
And later on in the season, they essentially took him off the "snap count" and he played regularly. He was playing 18 minutes per night, and 15 minutes per night at ES, which was second on the team among forwards in ES TOI per game. He played a lot more per game than Fantilli did last season.
I don't think you'll find a single jackets fan who wasn't questioning Vincents lack of trust of the kids on his roster, it was a major issue particularly with the Russians. There was a stretch where they shouldve have been getting thrown on the ice in clutch situations but Vincent just continued to throw Jenner and Johnny on ice, no matter how shit they looked up to that point.
This is obviously not the plan when bringing in Monahan to, by your own admission, to "get Gaudreau going". By your own words, Monahan will get the key offensive minutes. That blocks Fantilli from those moments.
Getting Gaudreau going is but one part of it. And it's not like Gaudreau and Monahan are locked into the best offensive opportunities and PP1 time for the entirety of their contract. Nor does that mean that there isn't room or a spot for Fantilli on the wing or on that powerplay.
Any coach worth a damn is going to play the hot hand and shocker, it's possible to have more than one line producing. It's about knowing your matchups and knowing which players/lines you can trust in certain situations.
This changes game by game and by the end of the season it's entirely possible that Fantilli has taken that next step. Or it's entirely possible that he's struggling and he needed some insolation.
Take the L man. Your own example you raised is a counter-argument against you and largely supports what I'm saying. You've shown you fundamentally don't understand what you're talking about.
Think about this from a Columbus standpoint for a second. This town has seen kid after kid after kid after kid come to the NHL at 18/19 years old, only to have a season or two of promise before never living up to expectations and then being traded or ending up as bust down the line.
We are in absolutely no rush to throw another promising prospect into the flames right away, Fantilli is not McDavid or Crosby. He's a good prospect, he's going to take time to develop.
And I've yet to see anyone make a valid case how this is a bad contract if he's producing similar to last year. The going rate in the NHL is more than 1M / 10ish points scored. About double that if you are a strong defensive player.
If 100pt top tier players are starting to see 11, 12, 13M+ deals, a 50 pt player getting a 5M deal seems right in line with that. Is it a year or two too long? Yeah sure, it's not perfect but no UFA deal is.
This is far from a hindrance or road block that you make it out to be.
But Monahan isn't defensively capable, so he doesn't check that box. And I am unconvinced by arguments that Wennberg doesn't check the leadership box. The team has no defensive structure and so that's a thing that needs to be learned, and yet we just committed to a mentor that exacerbates that problem rather than being someone capable of helping solve it.
That's up to having a competent coach to put the proper systems in place. Monahan and Gaudreau likely shouldn't be the ones taking defensive zone and PK draws and starts.
Yeah Wennberg helps defensively, but he doesn't help our lack of goal scorers. Gaudreau and Fantilli didn't mesh well last year and Wennberg doesn't seem the type that would help Johnny either. So now we're stuck with Jenner being the defacto 1C again.
Wennberg also hasn't had a single season with a FO% above 50%, Monahan has only had 1 season under 50%(49) and over the last handful of years has essentially been at 55%
