Miller Time
Registered User
- Sep 16, 2004
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"Shut up" was of course meant figuratively. Maybe I should have said, relax and wait. Almost 5 years after he was drafted kotkaniemi is finally looking like a first round pick.
I see this current regime making the same "mistakes" with slaf as they did with KK. Remember during kks promising rookie season he got dumped on his head by zadorov? Slaf took a couple bad hits this season yeah? Turns out it didn't damage kotkaniemi permanently, and it won't damage slaf permanently either. Neither did benching KK in the playoffs, or playing him 11 minutes a night as recently as last season in Carolina.
All this chat about rushing young players, linemates, ice time and usage when they're still developing makes my head spin. How they develop as players had very little to do with those variables and almost everything to do with just being able to wait while a player grows physically and mentally into his potential.
Not sure what you are looking at, but I don't see any comparison of how the org. is building a relationship with Slaf & how it previously navigated the relationship with JKO... Night & day really. Only thing in common is that they both started in NHL right away, but that's like saying that JKO & Tkachuk had the same treatment, which is of course demonstrably false.
There's a nuance lacking in drawing parallels btw these quite different situations.