Your (and others throughout this thread) descriptions of Pedan describes a player that has the wonderment coming out of Utica. What was he told by management or WD when he was up the first time? When he came back we saw a new and not so impressive Pedan.
The Pedan who went up to Vancouver to get his first NHL start at LW, about as bizarre a thing as could be imagined, was not the one who returned. He went up a solid good skating d-zone defenseman, who played his position well, was very difficult to beat wide, made the big hit when available, but didn't go looking for it, played the body, made the safe first pass, started the puck up ice himself when it was there, took a lot of wrist shots to ensure his shot got through, and released a bomb when the chance was there. Showed great promise, but still had some problems with coverage away from the puck.
The guy who returned was someone new. He acted like he was supposed to be the second coming of Bobby Orr. He ran all over the ice carrying the puck himself from one side of the defensive zone and back again, when pressured he made blind passes into the traffic lanes creating turnovers and great scoring chances. He took off on rink length dashes trying to toe drag and dippsy doodle his way to the net like Letang and was often stripped and caught up ice. He was a guy who who wanted to carry the puck all the time and had no idea where he was going, why, and what he was going to do when he got there. He pinched on every possible chance again often getting caught up ice. He was unleashing his slapper whenever he got the puck from way out as well as from all angles. Again this resulted in blocked shots for odd man breakouts and turnovers on the wide shots rocketing up the other side of the ice. Too often he was running around looking for the big hits and getting out of position or drawing penalties for his seek and destroy type mentality.
This was not the guy who left for Vancouver. That guy showed great promise of being a decent defender next season with the promise of developing into a real solid NHL defender in another season or two. I'm not so sure now. He didn't develop this new playing style on his own. The idea was planted in his head by someone and it wasn't done in Utica. You are now getting a look at this newly created bust for yourselves. I am sick when I know what kind of player he has become over the past 2 seasons and how that player has disappeared and been replaced by this anomaly in the same body.
As an after thought here, the only Comet who has gone up to Vancouver and come back playing better or the way he left was Zalewski. All the rest of them took a week or two to get back to playing the kind of hockey that got them the call-ups in the first place.
I hope this doesn't come off as defending 'the regime'… and I think the "Utica faithful" are going to hate it… but I don't mind this in general when we're talking the development of
some prospects. IMO you have to make a call on players you're developing -is the juice worth the squeeze? Someone like Sbisa, for instance, could do everyone a favour by becoming a low event player. There just isn't enough upside offensively in his game to make a lot of events appealing. He's obviously not a prospect, I think the same applies to Tryamkin. Safe is good.
Pedan is a different animal than Sbisa or Tryamkin, though imo. I've seen enough in his game offensively to want more events. His shot is top shelf, he can hit a player tape to tape two zones away and he creates plays that give you offensive possession. I like the juice.
The squeeze is what we've seen in his play recently. To be fair to Pedan, we've seen this from veteran defensemen that are trying to push the pace. People have turned on guys like Jovo, Bieksa and Edler at different points in their career when things go sideways. Still, this league is very tough to score goals in. You have to have a few guys back there stiring the drink.
I mentioned something similar to you early in the season about Subban, though I think it's more of a necessity for him than Pedan. At any time in his career, Pedan (or the team) can decide he needs to be low event and he'll still be a coveted player. While Subban certainly has to round out his game... he likely
can't be a low event defender. The people in charge want a physical element out of the guy, or at least don't want to lack one.
I think if you take a guy like Pedan or Horvat and try to make them a good NHL (or AHL) player as soon as possible, you might be leaving some potential behind. I know that players can be developed the other way around… Kesler was certainly one of them… but the tendency is to stay low event and ride the game around rather than being the kind of player that sets the pace of the game. That's fine for most players... but if you want a great team, you need guys that
make plays.
Usually, you'd like a guy like Pedan to be a little further along than he is right now but we know he's lacking pro experience -despite his age and waiver eligibility. And I'm not saying it's ok for him to play like he has been. I don't mind the Canucks pushing him to be more offensively, though, if that is indeed what happened. They don't need the best player they can get right now, they need the best player he can become.
Most people want him in the 5/6 position next year
