Eric Staal’s number 12 retired in Carolina

[sr edler]

Yeah, better to do it now before Sebastian Aho surpasses Staal in pretty much all of those categories.

Staal at his best was a better game-breaker than Aho and no compiled stats will change that.

 

[TheDawnOfANewTage]

I don’t respect who he is as a person, God told me. Good hockey player though.

 

[Mulletman]

Staal at his best was a better game-breaker than Aho and no compiled stats will change that.

That's not true at all. Don't let the fact that Aho looks like a Swedish vanilla midget fool you. Aho is the most underrated player in the league right now. He doesn't get the recognition that he would get if he was Canadian, American or Swedish. And he also plays in a small market that most don't follow. And it also doesn't help that @tarheelhockey and @AhosDatsyukian are terrible at pumping up his tires here on HFBoards. Hell they didn't even make a thread about him hitting 600 career points.

Now if you knew how to look up stats you would know that Aho leads the hurricanes and whalers combined in short handed goals, game winning goals and overtime goals. All 3 of those are game-breaker stats.

 

[sr edler]

That's not true at all. Don't let the fact that Aho looks like a Swedish vanilla midget fool you. Aho is the most underrated player in the league right now. He doesn't get the recognition that he would get if he was Canadian, American or Swedish.

He's not a game-breaker for them in the playoffs, much like Marner isn't a game-breaker for the Leafs in the playoffs, despite both collecting a respectable-looking amount of points. This is why you shouldn't stat watch so much, Mulletman.

 

[Oilslick941611]

I never really followed him because he spent a lot of time in Carolina and Carolina doesn't get much attention up here in Canada. Has he done enough to get his number retired? He was journeyman at the end of his career, which to me kind of ruins ones legacy.

 

[Svechhammer]

That's not true at all. Don't let the fact that Aho looks like a Swedish vanilla midget fool you. Aho is the most underrated player in the league right now. He doesn't get the recognition that he would get if he was Canadian, American or Swedish. And he also plays in a small market that most don't follow. And it also doesn't help that @tarheelhockey and @AhosDatsyukian are terrible at pumping up his tires here on HFBoards. Hell they didn't even make a thread about him hitting 600 career points.

Now if you knew how to look up stats you would know that Aho leads the hurricanes and whalers combined in short handed goals, game winning goals and overtime goals. All 3 of those are game-breaker stats.

I also agree that Aho isn't promoted enough in here, what are you doing, @tarheelhockey and @AhosDatsyukian

 

[Mulletman]

He's not a game-breaker for them in the playoffs, much like Marner isn't a game-breaker for the Leafs in the playoffs, despite both collecting a respectable-looking amount of points. This is why you shouldn't stat watch so much, Mulletman.

Jesus tap dancing Christ! Take a look at his nhl page: Sebastian Aho Stats And News In his bio you can read the following: "He had 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in 11 playoff games, joining Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux as the third player in NHL history to finish at least tied for his team's scoring lead in each of his first six postseasons."

Aho has nobody to play with except a washed up Brent Burns. Despite that Aho has reached double digit in points in all of his first 6 playoff runs. And that's something that no player in NHL history has done other than Aho, not even Gretzky and Lemieux was able to pull that off...

 

[sr edler]

Jesus tap dancing Christ! Take a look at his nhl page: Sebastian Aho Stats And News In his bio you can read the following: "He had 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in 11 playoff games, joining Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux as the third player in NHL history to finish at least tied for his team's scoring lead in each of his first six postseasons."

Aho has nobody to play with except a washed up Brent Burns. Despite that Aho has reached double digit in points in all of his first 6 playoff runs. And that's something that no player in NHL history has done other than Aho, not even Gretzky and Lemieux was able to pull that off...

Aho's a good player but you're stretching it here by going bananas over 12 points in 11 games. Or 12 points in 15 games (twice). Or 11 points in 14 games. My point is game-breaking ability. Panthers coach Maurice made a good point out of this some year ago when he (correctly) recognised William Nylander as the most dangerous or dynamic player on that (Toronto) team.

 

[Mulletman]

Aho's a good player but you're stretching it here by going bananas over 12 points in 11 games. Or 12 points in 15 games (twice). Or 11 points in 14 games. My point is game-breaking ability. Panthers coach Maurice made a good point out of this some year ago when he (correctly) recognised William Nylander as the most dangerous or dynamic player on that (Toronto) team.

Nylander has reached double digits in the playoffs once in 8 times and he's got to play with way better players than Aho has. There's nobody close to Matthews, Marner or Tavares for Aho to play with in Carolina, hell even Morgan Rielly is better than anybody else on the Carolina roster. While Nylander has been in Toronto, my Leafs have made the 2nd round just 1 time, while Aho has made the 2nd round every time he's gone to the playoffs! My Leafs would trade Nylander and a 1st to Carolina if there was any chance it would get us Sebastian Aho!

 

[sr edler]

Nylander has reached double digits in the playoffs once in 8 times and he's got to play with way better players than Aho has. There's nobody close to Matthews, Marner or Tavares for Aho to play with in Carolina, hell even Morgan Rielly is better than anybody else on the Carolina roster. While Nylander has been in Toronto, my Leafs have made the 2nd round just 1 time, while Aho has made the 2nd round every time he's gone to the playoffs! My Leafs would trade Nylander and a 1st to Carolina if there was any chance it would get us Sebastian Aho!

Slavin is miles better than Rielly. Teräväinen was a very good player for them, Svechnikov is also good enough. Also, Nylander doesn't play with Marner and Matthews at ES, they need these guys to always crutch for each other, for some reason. But this is a thread about Eric Staal.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Staal at his best was a better game-breaker than Aho and no compiled stats will change that.

I agree that Staal was more the “game breaker” type of player who could put a team on his back. He was a guy you could look at with the puck and clearly see that he was a top-10, maybe even top-5 center at his best. Aho is more of a steady, do-everything sort of player. He scores his points, but also has a strong two-way game, kills penalties, wins faceoffs, feeds his linemates. Different type of player on a less top-heavy team.

That said, Aho is also about two years younger than the age where Staal fell off hard, starting with the serious knee injury he sustained from a ridiculous cheap shot by Alex Edler during a World Championship quarterfinal of all times.



That was the moment that Staal’s prime ended and he began a long descent into more of a 40-60 point, slow, somewhat disgruntled player who did a tour of the league until he stopped getting contract offers. The only exception was the one blip year in Minnesota. The clip above was the last international play of his career.

Assuming Aho doesn’t face a similar injury/decline, he will almost certainly continue to be a winning factor for his team longer than Staal.