Brooks tried to put pressure on AV to play Shatty with McD, wrongly citing Yandle being used as a 3rd pairing D (4th in 5 on 5 ice-time, No 1 in PP, No 1 in OZone starts).
If anyone should be pressured to do anything, its Gorton to pull up his sleeves and solve the big issues we have on the roster. It is just a very unfavorable situation to enter next season with 4-5 of the top 6-7 Ds being around 30.
Would Gorton have resigned Smith if he knew Shatty was coming? He shouldn't be in the "ooooppppss" business.
Can Gorton handle the Staal situation? If not, there are other options. Smith can be traded from Day 1. Some, many if not most, will say like "Oh its not a big deal its good to have kids in the pipe they don't have to play right away they can play in HFD" etc etc etc. We all know how it will be. AV will play the vets. Maybe DeAngelo can bump Holden. But probably not for all games, its proven time and time again that it often is very hard for a young PMD to play behind an established PMD. They need the favorable offensive shifts to build confidence and learn the trade, if they only get left-overs the scale seem to tilt in a negative direction with them not being the best defensively while not getting to build confidence offensively.
The result will be that we in 2-3 years time stand there having wasted many of these kids -- the group being DeAngelo, Bereglazov, Graves, Pionk and co. -- with no result to show for it. Are we winning a Cup this season? I don't think the chances are smaller after the changes we have made up front to be honest, but will we be the best of 30? That seems like a long-shot at best, although I agree with the optimism shown by AV, its one thing to be very very good, top 4-8, and another chance to win. I think if we peak, we get into that 4-8 but don't see top 1.
Instead we have a chance to get 3 or even 4 kids onto the blueline in the coming 2 years. Skjei is there. DeAngelo should be a full-timer next season. Bereglazov is at least very very close to being a solid regular and should play from Day 1. He can handle a smaller role perfectly no doubt. That is 3. On top of that you have Graves and Pionk. I don't buy Graves on the right side, but I've been wrong before. Think Bereglazov makes zero sense on the right side. But you never know. Could become 4 if we have luck.
If we can do the above, keep building on the roster up front while infusing youth in Andersson and Chytil, we could have a very very solid platform to go forward from in the coming handful of years. Why should that be wasted on going all in on Vet Ds in the season of 17-18?
