Player Discussion Jesse Puljujärvi 4th Overall 2016 Draft. Part V: Called Up 11/10/17

[Bryanbryoil]

He has gotten Nuge back to where he needs to be. I hope that if by some chance he remains here next season that he can get Jesse going and not have Jesse feel like he is disliked or not trusted on the ice.

 

[VainGretzky]

Khaira is a 63rd pick. A draft number that invariably usually produces AHL, if anything players. He's vastly exceeded his pick and expected worth through some hard work, determination, willing to do extras, even fighting for the club, and has risen to the point where he is contributing far more than Pulju is to the team.

Pulju is an expected 3rd pick.

Sure Khaira has more experience but that shouldn't matter as much as it has considering the respective expected pedigrees of the players.
If we're really comparing a 3rd pick with a 63pick, and wherein the latter has clearly performed better, what is it saying about the former?

5 years post draft does have bearing , are you really going with this ? It's like comparing Reilly smith and his 5 years development to Draisaitl 9 point season and saying Draisaitl should be better than Smith 50 point season because he was a 3rd round 69th pick . You're a better poster than using strawman like this.

 

[nabob]

5 years post draft does have bearing , are you really going with this ? It's like comparing Reilly smith and his 5 years development to Draisaitl 9 point season and saying Draisaitl should be better than Smith 50 point season because he was a 3rd round 69th pick . You're a better poster than using strawman like this.

Check and mate. Some posters bread and butter are strawman arguments like his. Wonder if he'll create a new username in two years and dedicate all his posts to how amazing Puljujarvi is like he has with Draisaitl?

 

[CupofOil]

Pulju is presently having repeated stints with Draisaitl. How is tht not topsix?

I have no idea what you mean either. How is what the other poster posted evidence of where Pulju has played? It isn't.

I honestly have no idea what this latest reply from you is about. Its hard to follow.

Repeated stints? He played ONE game with him recently and to my recollection, he has played maybe 4 games with him all season.

Again, I just don't understand why you had all the time in the world for Yak even 4-5 years into his career when it was obvious that he was a bust yet you do the opposite with Puljujarvi. Because of one hot stretch in his rookie season, a lot of which came in the last 3 games of the season?

Also, can you or anyone explain why he hasn't gotten one look on the top PP unit, not ONE. Has anybody in the media bothered to ask Mclellan about this? Does anybody even care about developing this player? It's like he's an afterthought in the minds of the coaching staff, it's ridiculous.

 

[CupofOil]

To be honest I think their guy was Juolevi at 4 if Pulju didnt drop.

It actually looked like they were planning on trading down to 5 or 6 to pick him.

No, it was Sergachev from reputable sources. In retrospect, the Oilers missed the boat on that one but I'm sure Mclellan would have found a way to pressbox him in favor of Benning.

 

[Lacaar]

I've seen some pretty stupid plays by this kid lately.

He's quickly looking more like Yakupov.

I'm finding myself saying the same things... like wtf are you doing dude or why the hell are you there....

 

[FlameChampion]

I've seen some pretty stupid plays by this kid lately.

He's quickly looking more like Yakupov.

I'm finding myself saying the same things... like wtf are you doing dude or why the hell are you there....

Sadly I have been noticing this more as well. He just doesnt use his size to his advantage. He treats the puck like a grenade when he gets it, hes so eager to just get rid of the puck. He really makes some poor plays with the puck. Hopefully its just confidence. He looks so sporadic when he tries to make a play on the boards, i dunno its really weird.

I still think the organization should be playing him in the top 6 especially at this point in the season. He should be getting PP1 time instead of Lucic. The organization should be putting the kid in a position to succeed and seeing what we got in him.

When I watch him, hes good without the puck. But hes poor with the puck. Yakupov was pretty bad with the puck and certainly bad without the puck.

I hope the kid gets a skills coach in the summer and works hard. I hope theres a coaching change to at least give him a chance, but I do think he needs to show improvement as well.

 

[GameChanger]

Does anybody even care about developing this player? It's like he's an afterthought in the minds of the coaching staff, it's ridiculous.

I am sure the situation in the Oilers affetcs this as well. I mean there's McDavid and Drai so the organization is not desparate to develop another young star. The situation would've been different in some other teams with no such young stars in the team, as they would've utilized Pulju in marketing and given him an even longer leash than usual.

I've seen some pretty stupid plays by this kid lately.

I'd find some comfort in the fact at the beginning of the season pretty much nobody was seeing it or at least writing like that, so I do believe confidence has a lot to do with it. Of course it's a bit strange, but I've seen what good confidence means with these youngsters. It'd be lovely to see him play with high confidence again and TM could help him with that if he wanted.

It was a bit similar last year. He did fine and hid some possible weaknesses as long as he played in the top6 and had good confidence. After TM started to bench Jesse and give him just occasional minutes in lower lines things started get worse and his production stopped.

 

[fuswald]

To be fair...Pulju was probably our 4th best winger when he was down there.
He might of been better with a better center to play with but we will never know.
Currie, Rattie and Laleggia were the best forwards down there, period.

And all of them are MUCH older.

 

[GameChanger]

I hope the kid gets a skills coach in the summer and works hard. I hope theres a coaching change to at least give him a chance, but I do think he needs to show improvement as well.

I really hope the following things:

1. Jesse develops physically and if needed mentally, too, so he can play at his best effort level in most games. Even without other development (which I'm sure happens too) that could make him a very good player. I also hope he's mentally strong enough to deal with possible misuse.

2. Working on the things you mentioned. I've seen him do well with the puck so he should have it there, but some extra work will help, especially with the confidence side.

3. The absolutely ridiculous treatment is over and Puljujarvi gets to feel he's trusted by the coach. And he finally gets reall PP usage to show the shot he's got.

 

[CycloneSweep]

And all of them are MUCH older.

Yeah and 3 of them will never be an NHL player.

 

[CupofOil]

I've seen some pretty stupid plays by this kid lately.

He's quickly looking more like Yakupov.

I'm finding myself saying the same things... like wtf are you doing dude or why the hell are you there....

He has no confidence, hard for a young player to make smart plays when the confidence is lacking. Yak was just dumb as rocks on the ice, I don't see that in Pulju.

I do see some Paajarvi in him though. Big guy who doesn't use his size, speed, weak in the corners, problems with puckhandling, some defensive awareness and a good shot when he uses it but seldom does. The concerns are definitely there but in the same token, he isn't being put in a position to succeed.

 

[GameChanger]

This is only my opinion and I really(!) hope no-one gets offended by this, but I've never quite understood how it's so important for some people to keep bashing a player in their particular thread time after time. I understand and accept the amount of my messages can be considered strange as well, but I do think it's a different thing when it's your favourite player.

It just feels there's a few writers who stay away from this thread when Jesse is doing well, but bash him again and again when he goes through a difficult time.

However, I'm not perfect myself and I'm not trying to be a net police or whatever you call them in English, so I won't write about this again for at least quite some time.

 

[Yablo21]

Run him out of town! Its the only way anyone on this board will think he is a good player and wish he was on our team.

 

[McDNicks17]

Puljujarvi debuted next to Maroon and Draisaitl, not exactly chopped liver. It's easy to start someone high up and keep them high up when you are getting tangible results like that immediately, but how long do you keep them up in the line-up if they aren't producing and more-over are actively detracting from their linemates ability to produce or the teams ability to win. Donato is older than Pulju and probably more NHL ready then Pulju is even now with a seasons worth of NHL games under his belt and any argument based on a 1 game sample size is a poor argument.

Secondly is that one size fits all development model work for everyone? We gave Gagner that 2nd line treatment and he never improved, the same is basically true for Eberle as well, but on the 1st line and he showed very little growth in his game, his defensive game improved in his last season here, but only after his offensive game dried up.
What is it that is holding Jesse back?
What are the failings in his game that he needs to work on and how would they be better addressed by a spot higher up in the line-up?
What tools do we have (carrots and sticks) to bring out these changes? What does he respond well to?
Is the sole determining factor in his development how many minutes he gets on the ice and with whom?

Pulju has played 67 minutes of 5v5 with Leon this season and has by far his highest P/60 with him. Would have been nice to maybe try them together a little longer.


No, it isn't a one size fits all, but that's how NHL teams develop almost every top-end young player nowadays.

I would say the biggest thing is decision making and handling the puck. The problem is, when you put him with Strome and Lucic, you've now put him in a role that's vastly different than what he would be doing with McDavid or even RNH. In what way does playing with a couple of slugs who just hack at the puck(even though I've liked Strome this season) get you ready to play a shooter's role in the top6?

 

[Aerrol]

With the Swift Current Broncos he developed (6 years here): Colton Orr, Michal Rozsival, Brad Larsen, Josh Green, and Brent Sopel (+ lots of AHL guys and some cup of coffee NHL guys)

With the Cleveland Lumberjacks he developed (1 year here): Pascal Dupuis, Brett McLean, Nick Schultz, and Richard Park (already had one NHL season under his belt before going to the IHL)

With the Houston Aeros he developed (4 years): Zbynek Michalek, Stephane Veilleux, Jamie McLennan, Brent Burns (coached him 2 years in the AHL and 4 years in the NHL), Pierre-Marc Bouchard, Mikko Koivu, Derek Boogard, John Erskine, Mike Smith, and Josh Harding (Harding only played 151 games, but career cut short by illness and goalies get a limited number of starts) [Nick Schultz, Brett McLean, and Richard Park all played for the Aeros as well]

Coached 3 years for the Red Wings, but I'll just skip them since he was an assistant and you could just as easily attribute positive development to Babcock.

With the San Jose Sharks he developed (7 years) *limiting to young players who improved under him or debuted with him*: Devin Setoguchi, Marcel Goc, Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Douglas Murray, Jamie McGinn, Ryan Clowe (arguably broke out before he got there), Joe Pavelski, Logan Couture, Thomas Greiss, Torrey Mitchell, Jason Demers, Justin Braun, Andrew Desjardins, Tommy Wingels, Matt Irwin, Tomas Hertl (progressed year over year under McLennan, but break out year came after he left), Matthew Nieto, Melker Karlsson, and Chris Tierney.

With the Oilers I'm guessing you can pick out who he helped develop, all of our core players aside from RNH, Larsson, and Talbot; have to attribute some of their development to him and his failures to develop here would be Justin Schutlz, Nail Yakupov (?), Drake Caggiula (?), and Jesse Puljujarvi (so far...).


**tried to keep it to only names I recognized and players who played a minimum of 200 games in the NHL, pretty sure Harding was the only exception I made**
*note with Nick Schultz only coached him 21 games in total between the Lumberjacks and Houston Aeros, not sure if he deserves much credit there*

A lot of players he coached didn't turn into outright beasts, but there are a lot of players there who had lengthy careers. Couldn't pick out a single player in the AHL or with the Sharks who really struggled to develop under him to only get traded and blossom elsewhere, ofcourse a few players got better later on just from natural progression and experience, Ehrhoff is probably the strongest example of one blossoming post McLennan, but he did have his best offensive season to that point under McLennan (with the Sharks 4 years prior to McLennan and was traded after McLennan's 1st year as an NHL head coach), with the Canucks he kept his elevated point production from his last year as a Shark and greatly improved his plus/minus.

I appreciate the work done, and this might be asking for too much additional work, but:

How many of these players that he developed were European? How many of them were highly touted Europeans? I see from that list - Hertl, M Karlsson, Michalek? Most of his criticism here comes from his usage of European players, not just Pulju (but especially Pulju, given his skillset and draft position).

 

[Canovin]

The boys(McDavid, Drai, Nurse etc) should take Pulju under their wing and chill with him off ice. Make feel like he's one of them. The kid is most likely dealing with some kind of depression.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Repeated stints? He played ONE game with him recently and to my recollection, he has played maybe 4 games with him all season.

Again, I just don't understand why you had all the time in the world for Yak even 4-5 years into his career when it was obvious that he was a bust yet you do the opposite with Puljujarvi. Because of one hot stretch in his rookie season, a lot of which came in the last 3 games of the season?

Also, can you or anyone explain why he hasn't gotten one look on the top PP unit, not ONE. Has anybody in the media bothered to ask Mclellan about this? Does anybody even care about developing this player? It's like he's an afterthought in the minds of the coaching staff, it's ridiculous.

Its not complicated at all. I first saw Yakupov play in Sherwood Park in the Oilers prospects camp. In the first scrimmage game he blows everybody away scoring 3 goals, backchecking like a demon, and was so obviously better than anybody on the ice. FF to the preseason and regular season and he was a breath of fresh air scoring 17G in 48GP. Plus that his enthusiasm and joy was just contagious. I just loved that, loved the Cellys, loved a player that even stated that what he wanted was to try to put a smile on people's faces. That it meant a lot to him to do that. To me at the time I thought "This guy gets it, this is a pro athlete I could relate to that gets the missive of entertainment. To at least give joy in some way.

Look, its the same thing I'm saying about Ethan Bear. You knew what Yaks game was about in the first lockout shortened season. In half the games played it was indelible what the player did. What got him here.
Conversely, Pulju is such a strange player to figure out. I don't recall seeing a player who's NHL game looks so different, and so muted, as Pulju. You look at Euro hilites and its like its not the same player we are seeing here.

Finally why should the worst forward the team has in 2018 (even less productive than Lucic) be on the first unit PP. Pulju, again, has 0.50ppg/EV60mins. How is that warranting first unit PP and "oh my god, why don't they put him on the PP".

Maybe if he ever did something with his minutes he might eventually get some looks there. His play is too random for this coaching staff to trust him right now.

 

[Drivesaitl]

5 years post draft does have bearing , are you really going with this ? It's like comparing Reilly smith and his 5 years development to Draisaitl 9 point season and saying Draisaitl should be better than Smith 50 point season because he was a 3rd round 69th pick . You're a better poster than using strawman like this.

So I asked you who I should compare to Pulju then? Laine, Tkachuk, Dubois, Keller, Sergachev any other of a long list of similar age drafted players doing much better?


I don't theres anything dishonest, at all, with comparing Jesse to other prospects. Isn't this what hfboards is largely about? Should we just pretend that its obvious that there were better picks out there. Or that had we drafted Sergachev it would have made the Hall trade less likely?

 

[GameChanger]

Conversely, Pulju is such a strange player to figure out. I don't recall seeing a player who's NHL game looks so different, and so muted, as Pulju. You look at Euro hilites and its like its not the same player we are seeing here.

I see what you mean, but want to comment with one message.

At a better time I can dig up some comments from other team's fans from Jesse's best games. In some games they were drooling after him in their GDTs, so I'm still adamant that the best he's shown so far has already been pretty good or even pretty damn good. I'm actually suprised some people question this, but it's a shame he hasn't been ready to play at that level more frequently yet.

 

[GameChanger]

I don't theres anything dishonest, at all, with comparing Jesse to other prospects. Isn't this what hfboards is largely about? Should we just pretend that its obvious that there were better picks out there. Or that had we drafted Sergachev it would have made the Hall trade less likely?

That's fine, but keep in mind at least some, and probably none of those players would be quite the same in the Oilers. Unless their language skills or some other things would change the situation. Even if we forget Jesse this is a field where the Oilers could do better. I dare to say watching the way young prospects are developed is almost my specialty so I think I know what I'm talking about here.

But now I'll step aside again for tonight, as IMO it's not good for the others if a few writers constantly conquer one thread.

 

[Jaska]

I'm afraid Jesse is in a dark place. He is showing flashes, but his condidence isn't there. It's all mental.

 

[Drivesaitl]

This is only my opinion and I really(!) hope no-one gets offended by this, but I've never quite understood how it's so important for some people to keep bashing a player in their particular thread time after time. I understand and accept the amount of my messages can be considered strange as well, but I do think it's a different thing when it's your favourite player.

It just feels there's a few writers who stay away from this thread when Jesse is doing well, but bash him again and again when he goes through a difficult time.

However, I'm not perfect myself and I'm not trying to be a net police or whatever you call them in English, so I won't write about this again for at least quite some time.

If I can explain my own comments, and I don't need to, its because some players entice me. If I'm commenting on a player its generally meaning that I have expectations about the player, which is a good thing. Theres some players, like Nuge, that people feel I am very critical of, its not as simple as that, its that I tend to discern which players are not giving it their all. With Nuge that was obvious for years. Even his headcoach was saying he was left gas in the tank in the playoffs. I sometimes critique efforts where I feel the player should be doing better. for me this season its players like Lucic, Pulju, Slepy, Klef, I feel they should be better. So I post on that.

The other nature of players I comment on is my favorites and I've made that no mystery either. They are McD, Drai, Nurse, Maroon, Larsson, Talbot. Those are players that imo are difference makers on the club and that have a lot of latitude with me due to how good they are, or have been. So that I'm not critical of those players. That's how I roll. I see no real reason to be critical of players that are the consistent best players on a team. If Nuge plays like this to start next season he will be on that list as well.

Lastly when I watch hockey I key certain players. Again, generally because I am interested in those players performance. You won't find me talking about players like benning, Cammy, Cagg as much because I just see no merit in those players. People should be MOST offended if I barely even mention their favorite player. Its because I think that player is irrelevant.

Pulju is critical to the Oilers success because we have traded many wingers. So much rides on his success. Despite my tendencies it would still be virtually impossible not to be focusing on this player. He's the top winger prospect on a club without wingers. Theres very much of a focus on him.

hope this makes it more clear and its some disclosure anyway

 

[Drivesaitl]

That's fine, but keep in mind at least some, and probably none of those players would be quite the same in the Oilers. Unless their language skills or some other things would change the situation. Even if we forget Jesse this is a field where the Oilers could do better. I dare to say watching the way young prospects are developed is almost my specialty so I think I know what I'm talking about here.

But now I'll step aside again for tonight, as IMO it's not good for the others if a few writers constantly conquer one thread.

Tkachuk, Sergachev, Keller, would be the same here. Actually Keller would be far better here. What does he have to work with in Arizona.

Tkachuk would play even tougher here and especially when we had all of Maroon, Lucic, Kass as backup. Its actually harder for Tkachuk to play his antagonize role on the soft Flames. He ends up paying for it more there.

Sergachev would get more looks and higher looks here than in Tampa. The Lightning are a loaded team and harder to break into. Albeit its a great team to learn on.

 

[onetweasy]

Would love to see what Ralph Krueger could do with a player like Pulju. Not saying I want him back as a head coach but he seemed like a guy who really paid attention to a players confidence and tried to build guys up based on what they do well. Schultz, Yak etc.

Still think he would have made a great assistant coach.