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Should Alexis Lafreniere Go to WJC?

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Should Lafreniere Go to WJC?

  • Yes

  • No

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It is not that it is harder to play in than pro hockey, obviously not. But to the player, the World Juniors is obviously more important than NHL regular season games. International hockey is the probably the pinnacle of the sport and the WJC is huge even though it is an under-20 tournament.
 
McSauer said:
My father is obsessed with it haha die hard Rangers fan since the 60s, but he just loves USA Hockey so much, and lives for this tournament. We watch every year, but just exhibition hockey to me...
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I watch it every year. It's a lot of fun. But I would never say it's close to pro hockey in terms of how important it is to players.
 
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AB13 said:
It is not that it is harder to play in than pro hockey, obviously not. But to the player, the World Juniors is obviously more important than NHL regular season games. International hockey is the probably the pinnacle of the sport and the WJC is huge even though it is an under-20 tournament.
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you realize players get paid a lot of money to play regular season games, right?
 
McSauer said:
My father is obsessed with it haha die hard Rangers fan since the 60s, but he just loves USA Hockey so much, and lives for this tournament. We watch every year, but just exhibition hockey to me...
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I love watching the tournament, too. Since I am always off the week between Xmas and New Years, I watch as many games as I can. If you give me the choice between the Rangers winning the Cup and the US winning 5 World Jr Championships in a row, I will take the Rangers winning the Cup any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
 
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patnyrnyg said:
I love watching the tournament, too. Since I am always off the week between Xmas and New Years, I watch as many games as I can. If you give me the choice between the Rangers winning the Cup and the US winning 5 World Jr Championships in a row, I will take the Rangers winning the Cup any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
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Yup, since they started airing it, it's a tradition to watch that time of year...

But it's cup or nothing lol PLEASE
 
Richard Banger said:
You have no idea what you are talking about. The NHL is the best of the best.

the NHL has higher priority than the Olympics. So yeah it should be given higher priority over a tournament for kids.
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In terms of prestige, I'd probably rank the Olympics no 1, with the NHL close behind at 2. IIHF WC at 3, ahead of the WJC.

The WJC is exciting to watch but for players it will never be a priority over the other 3.
 
You guys are missing my point. The WJC is more relevant than a few regular season games in January.
 
The WJC has been, and always will be, just an exhibition tournament that affects pretty much nothing except for some extra media hits and fan bragging rights.

In regards to actual impact on a players development and effect on their playing ability...entirely negligible.

Also lol thinking the WJC is more important than a handful of NHL games.
 
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The WJC wasn't even that big of a deal until the lockout when no one had any hocky to show and the tournament was loaded with talent and Canadian broadcasting went all in on it.

Like I'm not saying it was a no name tournament type thing but the whole thing of it being this huge event is a relatively recent-ish thing.
Then again I guess that's 15 years ago and kids who were born then and grew up watching it be a big thing are now about to play in it...

Ultimately I would think that as a juniors player, as a kid the WJC is like the pinnacle, the big thing, the "go represent your country at the best tournament in the world (for players your age)". Of course that's big, and for some of the younger guys or guys who don't have that big of hopes of making the NHL or playing pro, it may be more important at that point in time to them than some nebulous concept of playing in the NHL.

A player like Lafreniere has played in multiple WJCs, won gold, won MVP, drafted in the NHL first overall and is preparing for his first NHL season. At this point he's transitioned from a junior to a pro pretty much. The WJC is a cherished memory and high point/milestone in his career to that point. Now it's a whole different game, a whole different level of accomplishment and newer heights to achieve.
At least, that's my thoughts
 
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It's an awesome tourney usually dominated by Canada so i can see why people try and dismiss it as unimportant in the hockey world. Much like i think basketball at the olympics is an exhibition nobody cares about.
 
Inferno said:
With that said the single greatest hockey game I've ever seen was usa vs Canada for the gold with John carlson scoring the overtime winner.
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There have been some great moments for most of the top hockey countries, its seriously part of my holiday plans every year. Hopefully covid doesn't mess it up but its looking like a really tight race as to who wins it this year.
 
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Inferno said:
With that said the single greatest hockey game I've ever seen was usa vs Canada for the gold with John carlson scoring the overtime winner.
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Yeah, some of the best and most memorable games I've seen in my lifetime are non-NHL games. That doesn't make it better than the NHL though. The WJC gets romanticized a lot by fans because it is a Christmas/New Years thing. It's 6-7 games for each team over the course of 2 weeks. NHL is 82 games over 6 months. So yeah, the WJC moments feel "special".

But this whole notion some people are trying to sell that WJC is more important than NHL regular season games? I can't agree with that
 
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Amazing Kreiderman said:
Yeah, some of the best and most memorable games I've seen in my lifetime are non-NHL games. That doesn't make it better than the NHL though. The WJC gets romanticized a lot by fans because it is a Christmas/New Years thing. It's 6-7 games for each team over the course of 2 weeks. NHL is 82 games over 6 months. So yeah, the WJC moments feel "special".

But this whole notion some people are trying to sell that WJC is more important than NHL regular season games? I can't agree with that
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I mean it's apples and oranges...it's a kids tournament versus playing in the top hockey league in the world as an "adult", competing for a famous trophy, and frankly having a "real job/career"

An individual NHL game may not be that important so to speak but when looking at it from the development of a talented kid breaking into the NHL and hoping to establish himself as a star, a NHL game is more important for his development and future than going back to a tournament he's played in multiple times, won, was MVP,etc.

Honestly I think most of these "they should always play it's such a big deal!" posts are being deceptive when what they're really trying to say is "I want to see all the best talent at this tournament because I like it that way!" and is far less about what the players would want or need.
 
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The WJC is more of a mental test than anything. Of a player, it asks and hopefully answers how he performs on a big stage, how he performs under pressure, if he’s clutch or a choker, how he handles adversity, etc. It’s far less a test of skill. If you’re talking about a yiung kid playing in the adult WCs, that’s a bit different. That asks and answers if he can physically handle playing against grown men. We already know Laf is skilled, we’ve already seen the “It” factor. If you’re talking about reps, I’d much rather see pre-season games. The WJC isn’t going to teach us anything new.
 
I said no. There’s nothing left to prove at that level, and it really seems like the league is going to get back to business within the next month or so.

If they were going to cancel the season I’d probably say yes though.
 
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It’s obviously not the Rangers intention but them inadvertently giving Team Canada the finger and not letting Laf participate makes me laugh
 
With the tournament being in Canada, would he have to quarantine for a period upon returning to New York? That could explain why Toronto is releasing Robertson, but the Rangers aren't releasing Lafreniere.
 
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