You can scrimmage and practice until the cows come home, but you can't figure out how 'close' a guy is, until he actually plays.
I mean if Abbotsford was fighting tooth and nail to get into the playoffs, then I can understand going with a more conservative lineup. But these final 10 games or so don't really matter a damn.
There's nothing the organization needs to learn about him right now that is going to affect where they plan to play him next season, so there is nothing to be gained by throwing him into games that "don't really matter a damn."
We all know that the plan is to play him in the AHL next season and that isn't going to change by watching him in some late season AHL games now.
Aside from the fact the organization doesn't need to see him right now, if watching a new player in end of season garbage time gave a valid evaluation of a player's level, Akito Hirose would have spent most of this season in the NHL rather than being an AHL reserve.
Whether they play him now depends on whether they think it will be the best thing for his development and whether he's ready to contribute more than players who have been playing their systems in North American hockey all season, not for the organization to get some information that won't change their plans and which wouldn't be reliable anyway.