Re: Who should not be kept here?
Originally Posted by
Palefa
I am in a win now (next year) situation. It is good that you challenge me on this move. The next question is therefore: what's next with Laine? Is he able to bounce back in Columbus? His shot rate has drop to 1.9 per game while it was always over 3. And he is still getting PP minutes and over 17min total per game.
A good question. No one has a crystal ball here and I certainly don't, but I'm convinced that Laine will bounce back. He's 24 years old and has put up no less than 50 pts in his career including 3 seasons of over 60 in his short 5 year NHL career. These are pretty impressive numbers with the exception of this years anomaly. If Torts is gone, or Laine is traded, I fully expect him to rebound. That said, there is risk that this regression continues. Continuing on discussing risk, we need to take a hard look at what might be in store for Caulfield and Raymond. All to often the expectations associated with prospects prove to be a bit optimistic. If we are talking a Crosby, McDavid or a Matthews, well, that's one thing, but I just can't see either Caulfield or Raymond fitting into that elite group that immediately transitions into the NHL and produce big numbers right from the get go. Rather, there will be a learning curve and if all goes well, steady improvement. And yes, there is risk that one of these guys doesn't pan out as expected, this is a reality we see time and time again with top ranked prospects that struggle early on. All this to say, if I'm in win now mode, I'm comfortable with the risk associated with keeping Laine rather than the risk associated with hitching my wagon to totally unproven prospects.
14 Team Roto; Keep 25; 12 F, 6 D, 2 G; 10 Farm; 5 Bench; 5 IR;
Salary Cap - 102.5 Mil
Scoring Cats: G, A, Pts, PIM, Hits, BS, SOG, F Points, D Points; Win+Ties+SO, GAA, SV%
Keepers
F: Aho, Larkin, DeBrincat, Vrana, Bennett, Scheifele, Kakko,Tolvanen, McBain,
D: Heiskanen, Fox, Toews, Lundqvist
G: Swayman, Andersen, Copley
Drops
F: Gaudreau, Terravainen, Puljujarvi, Kravstov, Zary
D: Brannstrom, Cernak, Alexeyev
G: Korpisalo, Merzlikins
FARM: Rossi, Berggren, Holtz, Savoie, Clarke, Tarasov, Wolf