Line Combos: CBJ Roster Discussion/Line Combos/Injury Report (No surgery for KJ, but out long term, Voronkov practicing)

[NotCommitted]

Macelli must be compared with Marchenko, Johnson and Chinakhov.

And you could easily make an argument he's shown more so far in his career than any of those guys. Marchenko I feel pretty confident about, what he's shown in the NHL so far I think the floor is pretty high for him. Johnson and Chinakhov both look like they've taken a step forward but Johnson is out with a shoulder injury (again ) and while Chinakhov has all the tools to be great top-6 wing he's yet to show he can be that consistently. I think the odds are good he can, but you never really know until players actually do it.

I'm not saying Macelli is necessarily a player the Jackets should be targeting, but if he somehow ended up here it's not like he'd be stuck in the bottom-6 by default because top-6 winger spots are blocked by guys clearly better than him. He could easily become the best player of the 4. AFAIK he was usually the guy driving offense for his lines with the Coyotes.

 

[MoeBartoli]

I know the coaches wanted to get more balance in the lines and also want to get Fantilli going. But moving Chinakov off the top line has hurt the top line and not been that beneficial to Fantilli or Chinakov - individually or as a line.

The top line is still good but prior to the move it looked like a legitimate top line. I’d be fine with switching Sillinger and Chinakov.

 

[VT]

And you could easily make an argument he's shown more so far in his career than any of those guys. Marchenko I feel pretty confident about, what he's shown in the NHL so far I think the floor is pretty high for him. Johnson and Chinakhov both look like they've taken a step forward but Johnson is out with a shoulder injury (again ) and while Chinakhov has all the tools to be great top-6 wing he's yet to show he can be that consistently. I think the odds are good he can, but you never really know until players actually do it.

I'm not saying Macelli is necessarily a player the Jackets should be targeting, but if he somehow ended up here it's not like he'd be stuck in the bottom-6 by default because top-6 winger spots are blocked by guys clearly better than him. He could easily become the best player of the 4. AFAIK he was usually the guy driving offense for his lines with the Coyotes.

Only we have to think about the lineup for the future as well and Jenner and Johnson will be back. What then? He's not a top player, they're easy to do without.

 

[Palmu]

Future would be something like this:

Chinakhov-Monahan-Marchenko
Voronkov-Fantilli-Maccelli
Jenner-Sillinger-KJ
ZAR/Pyyhtiä-Danforth-Olivier

Easy

 

[NotCommitted]

Only we have to think about the lineup for the future as well and Jenner and Johnson will be back. What then? He's not a top player, they're easy to do without.

But by that some token all the guys Maccelli would be battling for ice time with are easy to do without, none of them have truly been "top players" for the Jackets for any length of time yet. I'm not saying Jackets should be going out of their way to get this guy but it's not like the forward depth is so phenomenal he would be completely surplus to requirements.

For now I'd be perfectly happy to give big minutes to all the home grown talent and see what they can do, but chances are some of them won't work out or won't be long term pieces because they want out, ask too much money, struggle with injuries or whatever. So if a guy like Maccelli happened to be available in a trade that makes sense, I wouldn't be so quick to turn it down just because there are CBJ drafted players in the org who might (or might not) be just as good as him - like I said it's entirely possible he'd be the best of the bunch.