“Change of Scenery” players that stayed and reached their potential?

[Ralph Malfredsson]

Pavol Demitra

Mika Zibanejad

 

[WhiskeyYerTheDevils]

This player ended up becoming the captain of his team and scored over 100 points.
League/GP/G/A/P
View attachment 570096

Henrik Sedin?

 

[PatLaFontaineASMR]

Tage Thompson

 

[Bouboumaster]

In 2010 people wanted to trade Price because of Jaroslav Halak's heroics

Somewhere in 2013 Price became a Hockey God

 

[EpochLink]

Naslund demanded a trade out of Vancouver in the 1997-1998 season, during the Mike Keenan era. That whole team that year was a mess, if I recall Keenan healthy scratched Naslund and that was probably his breaking point.

During the 1998-1999 season, Naslund finally broke out of his slump and showed his potential, becoming one of the better players of the early 2000’s

 

[EpochLink]

Henrik Sedin?

Bingo.

The Sedins took awhile to develop, the Canucks during those first 4 years they were in the league relied on Naslund/Bertuzzi/Morrison for their offense.

It wasn’t until after the 2005 lockout they finally turned out and developed into the players that would eventually win scoring titles/MVP’s, all the way to the hall of fame.

 

[Peat]

Tristan Jarry was on the verge of being traded in Summer 2019. Couldn't seem to piece it all together consistently and had run out of waiver exemption at the moment Casey DeSmith had stolen his place. But when teams wouldn't meet Rutherford's valuation, he said to hell with a meritocracy, I've got my asset value to protect. and praise the thunder god he did because he's flourished here.

 

[Deep Blue Metallic]

Guy Lafleur definitely

Guy epitomizes the OP's scenario.

He was booed mercilessly some nights in Montreal before becoming a perennial All-Star starting in his 4th season. I wonder if the Habs considered trading him during his 3rd season when he regressed to 21 goals?

 

[Riddum]

This player ended up becoming the captain of his team and scored over 100 points.
League/GP/G/A/P
View attachment 570096

So there's hope for Kotkaniemi

You know, Seguin went to the Stars and then put up a few great seasons.

I wouldn't put Seguin in the same category as Puljujarvi. Seguin played 12 mins a game in his first year. In his second season, he put up a respectable 29g 67pts in 81 games.

Puljujarvi played with McDavid and Draisaitl. He managed to score a couple of goals but his production was subpar.

Evander Kane, came in, having not played at the NHL level since the previous year and tore it up with these guys. This makes me believe that Puljujarvi doesn't have the talent to be the force people think he could be... Or perhaps he doesn't have any chemistry with these guys but I don't think he has the potential that people think he has.

 

[yada]

Chris Kreider.

Maybe someone could correct me on this, but I'm only suggest Kreider, since I've seen his name come up numerous times on the trade bait board every other season for a change of scenery. Yet, he stayed with the NYR and finished his 10th season with them.

He's never hit over 30 goals in his life until he scored 52 last season. His highest career in goals before last season was 28 goals on 2 ocassions.

50 is the weirdest result but he couldve hit low 30s about 3 times. He had incredible hot stretches in 21 but the season was short. What defines him are the long droughts which somehow never happened in 22.

With full seasons in 20 and 21 he was on pace for 31 and 33 goals. 24 in 63 and 20 in 50.

 

[yada]

Jake Debrusk looked finished in Boston, submitted a trade request … and then scored 18 goals in the last 34 games of last season.

Markus Naslund was going nowhere in Vancouver and actually traded to Anaheim in the fall of 1997 … only to have the Canucks back out of the deal at the last minute because some other players got hurt and the team needed warm bodies.

Holy crap thats a crazy story about naslund. I never heard that before. Crazy how different sports coverage was back in the late 90s to how it has been since the early 00s.

 

[cgf]

Nathan MacKinnon.

Being serious here. I remember too many times when I had to explain how Nate's pt totals regressing from the 63 he got in his rookie year, didn't mean that his play was regressing. How he needed time to learn to play C against top competition after having split that rookie season between RW & centering a sheltered 3rd line.

How Nate was progressing from godawful defensively towards competent...and how, as he filled out & learned what his gifts let him do at this level, he was starting to dominate the action on the ice for longer & longer stretches; despite age & guys wanting to leave making his supporting cast weaker & weaker.


Before he broke out, there was a lot of talk on this board about whether Nate had the hockey IQ to ever become a PPG guy and whether he was ever going to be able to take that step in Colorado. With a lot of fans arguing that MacK had peaked as a rookie and that the league had simply figured him out.

Talks that got louder & louder during Nate's draft+3 season...in which (IIRC) he injured his wrist after being close to PPG through the first few months of the campaign, despite the rest of the team being ice cold...before crescendoing during that disastrous 48pt season when the wheels really fell off.

Even though all of the talk was about how you couldn't keep a core together after s***ting the bed like that, we kept Nate & the rest of our core guys who wanted to stay. One year later Nate was getting robbed of the Hart trophy; silencing those talks once & for all as he hasn't paced for less than 99pts in an 82-game season, since.

 

[cgf]

Draisaitl? Idk if anyone really wanted him gone but he was sent back to the whl and then when he came back he started dominating and hasn't looked back

I did. I wanted Sakic to trade the pick that would become Byram for Drae

 

[The Kingslayer]

Most players with JP's tools and skillset flourish around 25. Rarely are they with the team that drafted them.

Broke out on other teams:
Blake Wheeler
Olli Jokkinen
John Leclair
Todd Bertuzzi
Jarome Iginla


Johann Franzen broke out at like 29 with the wings.



Puljujaarvi could be a Wheeler/Jokkinen type. I don't wanna trade him. Jokkinen barely even looked like an NHLer until he broke out at 25.

Maybe Holland sees some Franzen in him and keeps him.


The ingredient missing from their games is assertiveness on ice. If JP ever figures that out, I could see him being a dominant force in this league. Be a shame to watch him do that for another team.

Mike Keenan saved Jokinens career.

I did. I wanted Sakic to trade the pick that would become Byram for Drae

Wanted Chia to accept the Barrie for Leon trade.

 

[Perfect_Drug]

So there's hope for Kotkaniemi

I wouldn't put Seguin in the same category as Puljujarvi. Seguin played 12 mins a game in his first year. In his second season, he put up a respectable 29g 67pts in 81 games.

Puljujarvi played with McDavid and Draisaitl. He managed to score a couple of goals but his production was subpar.

Evander Kane, came in, having not played at the NHL level since the previous year and tore it up with these guys. This makes me believe that Puljujarvi doesn't have the talent to be the force people think he could be... Or perhaps he doesn't have any chemistry with these guys but I don't think he has the potential that people think he has.

Or he's young and hasn't figured it out.


You should have seen how mediocre John Leclair was as a hab, or Olli Jokkinen as a King. Neither looked like they had any chance of being 90 point players.

 

[Captain Mountain]

Jeff Petry feels like an obvious one. There were extenuating circumstances in Edmonton, but his game really started evolving on a year by year basis in Montreal until he was legitimately strong top pair D-men who could produce at ES with the best of them against top competition.

 

[cgf]

Wanted Chia to accept the Barrie for Leon trade.

Oh what could've been...

 

[GermanSpitfire]

Tage Thompson?

 

[EpochLink]

Holy crap thats a crazy story about naslund. I never heard that before. Crazy how different sports coverage was back in the late 90s to how it has been since the early 00s.

There were rumblings around that time that Naslund could’ve been a huge bust. He was producing what, 40-50 points for a first round pick, 22-21 goals is fine production but that 97-98 season was really poor..14 goals/20 assists were alarm raising.

He just needed the right coach and the right system to get him going.

Same can be said for Todd Bertuzzi, he shown absolutely nothing when he got traded to Vancouver. The year Naslund broke out, Bertuzzi was bad and inconsistent. The next two years, he finally showed something that he can be an NHL player then he snapped out of funk with 2 years of point producing consistency.

 

[super6646]

This player ended up becoming the captain of his team and scored over 100 points.
League/GP/G/A/P
View attachment 570096

MSL or H. Sedin is my guess on this one.

Damn that prick @WhiskeyYerTheDevils beat me to it.

 

[Perfect_Drug]

Jeff Petry feels like an obvious one. There were extenuating circumstances in Edmonton, but his game really started evolving on a year by year basis in Montreal until he was legitimately strong top pair D-men who could produce at ES with the best of them against top competition.

We liked Petry in Edmonton. We knew he was fantastic.

He was fantastic in his RFA contract, and worked his way into our top pair. Our absolute doornob of a GM (nepotism hire) in Craig MacTavish gave him a 1-year show-me deal to unrestricted free agency.

Petry rightfully felt sleighted by the lack of trust by our management, so he refused to sign a lowball extension, so had to trade his rights as a rental.


But yeah we like Petry a lot and hated our terrible management. We put up billboards to fire Kevin Lowe. These idiots are morons and have not been hired outside of Edmonton a we all predicted.

 

[Gordievsky]

Edit: lol. I didn't read the thread title properly. This guy definitely didn't 'stay' to reach his potential.

I'm a bit older so I go back a bit further - this guy won a Masterton, had a few 50g seasons and is in the HOF. And would've been captain but for another HOF'er on the team.

GP	G	A	Pts	+/-
56	16	15	31	1
72	21	18	39	-26
73	14	20	34	-29