let's stop acting like he isn't hurting his line 5v5.
You need to quantify it somehow, not just make the claim. I bet if you looked, Newhook has better stats with Laine than without him. Easy to say because the line was the worst in the league when he got in it and it's not that anymore.
He isn't hurting his line, he's making it better. Even with limited mobility. He's a far better offensive player than Newhook or Dach or Heineman or Armia etc that they have had in that line.
Defensively he's no selke candidate but can hold his own among the wingers in this team in comparison. Again, if you disagree then quantify it somehow.. Armia is noticeably better defensively, that I'll give you for sure. He's a PK specialist and a 4th liner so it's kinda expected too.
If I watched hockey like some of you do and focus on every individual puck loss or bad touch in offensive zone and complained about each one, I could have written a book about Slaf and even Suzuki yesterday but I thought they played an overall good game, there's absolutely no point in making mountains out of molehills and report on their every mistake and pretend that's all you get.
Let's also agree he has been neutralized on the pp. Something has to give and he has to be better next year.
Did you watch last night? His best chance in the game came on PP on the right side of slot. He moves around when opponents are covering him.
When opponents dedicate a player to cover Laine, the rest of them have a 4 on 3 PP which is better, and SHOULD be able to convert that extra room to goals.
Like they did in the Chicago game, where Foligno was stuck on Laine and he chose not to block Hutson from moving into the slot so Hutson took that runway and then made the pass that bounced of Slafs's skate into the net and resulted in tying goal.
With all that talent around, they should be better at using that extra room that Laine's presence on the left side brings. Make the opponent pay for that choice.
They'll stop special covering him, when the rest of the PP is more dangerous than him. It's a calculation to the opponent. When allowing that 4 on 3 situation is less desirable than giving Laine room for a onetimer. So far, the opponents are choosing to block Laine, because math.
And yes he needs to be better next year, hopefully the knee gets a lot better over the off season
I thought they looked better yesterday than previous game, Laine and Demidov had some practices together. More repetition will help but they are gelling already. Newhook isn't ideal but for this season he's probably going to be the guy centering them.