Borberg looks very much like a player who just hasnt found his confidence. He looks tentative to me.
There is so much more he can give out there...he just needs to believe in himself.
He needs a mentor and Ekholm is the obvious choice.
That said I dont think that Broberg can handle top 4 minutes at this point in time.
Fun thing with confidence is it can turn around very quickly in a good situation. Bouchard's pre- and post-TDL play is a great example of that.
Nurse played with Larsson for a while, I’d say that was his most reliable partner. It wasn’t a great pairing.
Imo Nurse needs a partner that likes to move the puck. Ceci and Larsson are happy to always defer to their partner to move the puck; and Nurse loves to lead the breakout, despite having average-at-best vision. Add in the fact his skating wasn't its usual level last year (fallout from last playoff's injury is my guess), so his usual get-out-of jail-free play wasn't available and it was a reciepe for poor, inconsistant play. The fact that Nurse and Ceci's boxcars look decent is a small miracle, espesically as they were buried going against elites, where percision is usually everything.
When he was with Barrie (and even Bear) breakouts were far more orderly because either Barrie(Bear) passed it out, or Nurse took advantage of the extra space (as teams couldn't key in on him) to skate it out.
My tiering for partners with Nurse goes:
1)
Bouchard: Best passer and offensive defenceman on the team, Nurse is capiable of covering for him defensively and his puck rushing allows the pair to always get up the ice. Playing this role is what got Nurse 9mil in the first place.
2)
Kulak: Plus skater, and is more than competant with the puck on his stick. You'd still see Nurse trying to do too much here, but Kulak actually has the speed and puck skills to be a good safety valve for him.
3)
Broberg: Similar to Kulak, but just lacks the experence/confidence to not defer to Nurse all the time
4) Ekholm: You'd get the best out of Nurse, but it would remove the big strengh of the defence and its ability to have one of the them on the ice for 45+min.
...
...
...
1,000)
Ceci: While decent defensively, his lack of speed and puck skills leads to Nurse trying to do too much. And unlike Kulak or even Broberg, he doesn't have the speed or the puck skills to get a derailing play back on track. Ceci would be better off playing full time with any of the other LHD still with the team, that includes Gleason and Niemo.
1,001)
Vinny: Same as Ceci, but worse.
The two breakdowns I like for the defence are...
Nurse-Bouchard
Ekholm-Broberg
Kulak-Ceci
... with Kulak-Ceci doing a lot of heavy lifting. Or, one sililar to last year...
Ekholm-Bouchard
Nurse-Kulak
Broberg-Ceci
... where you have Ekholm and Bouchard stay together, Broberg-Ceci slide into Kulak-Vinny's role, and you continue to roast Nurse's pairing, but hope Kulak can mop up mistakes better than Ceci.
