Thank Alfie, Hamonic will be gone at the end of the season, just another disastrous Dorion's file. We traded a valuable 3rd round pick to get him and gave him a 2 years too long extension with a NMC, which is why we were stuck with him. I hope it didn't do permanent damage on Sanderson but his first half this season was nothing like last year. Jake is KEY to this WHOLE rebuild so kinda dangerous to play him with a guy like Hamonic.
I have nothing against JBD and actually like that he's around, he's young, cheap and plays the right way. That said, he's not the perfect compliment to a rookie like Kleven, they only have a 42.8 xGF% together. Best metrics for Kleven is when he played with Zub or Chabot, although small sample sizes.
The problem I have is the things you say are just not factually true, it is obvious pure bias. It is true that Brannstrom is not sought after because he is undersized and unfortunately for him, he doesn't produce enough offense for a team to justify making a spot for him. There is not a lot of D-men under 6'0 in this league and it's normal because most modern D-men can move the puck these days and they are all much taller/bigger. Vancouver already have Hughes and he's elite so they don't really need/want a guy like Brannstrom as you will want Hughes out there on every OZ start. It was going really well for Brannstrom there at first (but they needed him during Forbort injury) so not sure why they moved on from him because Juulsen, Desharnais and even Soucy have been terrible in comparison. And if you think the moves makes the unanimity you should read this :
Hronek is going to join the team from his conditioning stint. Interesting but not surprising in the least they’re keeping Brisebois up over Brannstrom.
Apparently, it's probably just because their staff don't play D-men on their off-side and they already have Hughes, Soucy and Forbort playing regularly on LD. All that said, if "
extremely weak defensively" was true, it would be reflected in his advanced stats. But looking at the last 3 seasons, he has the 43th best xGA/60 among 238 D-men at ES, which means the team he plays for gives up LESS scoring chances when he is on the ice than it is the case for most D-men in the league... The type of guys who are the lowest in this stat are Klingberg, Krug, DeAngelo, Karlsson, Letang, Josh Brown, Matheson, Barrie, Drysdale... If Brannstrom was just a bit faster, or just a bit taller, or just a bit more productive or even just a RHD, he would have a regular spot by now. Hopefully it happens for him soon but for me, I take a Brannstrom over a Hamonic or Juulsen 100 times out of 100.