That question is irrelevant. Do you think Johansen is better on a John Tortorella coached team than Duchene is on a John Tortorella coached team?Do you think Johansen is better than Duchene? He didn't hit 60 until his 3rd season and I'd wager most would take him over Duchene.
Some people are late bloomers, some people take time to adjust to the NHL. In Wennbergs case he has to completely change his game to play on a smaller ice. Duchene is older and more expensive.
I still think Wennberg is a better fit on a line with two goal scorers. Wennberg has improved in every statistical category every year. Literally every signs point to continued growth. Duchene MIGHT have a little more room, but we know what Duchene is capable of. We don't need more goal scorers. We have plenty.
Vainio and Kukan.18 minutes/night isn't minimal. If he's eating PK and DZ starts and allowing Werenski and Jones easier minutes it's well worth it because they can feast on lesser opponents. Werenski should be better this season, but his offense dried up when he started getting pk minutes.
I guess it really depends on Jenner, if they think he's going to be gone awhile and they don't have faith in Dalpe or anyone else they could make a move.
But seriously our wings are good enough for Foligno to move to center and our depth on wings will be fine.
I really think we have the depth to weather these injuries early on.
I can't say I agree.
PLD will continually be tested at center
Thurkauf, Vigneault and Stenlund will be competing for a center job next season.
And we have about 5 guys in the system listed as C/W not on our roster, not to mention the 4 guys on our roster who can play wing or center.
As far as D in the system ahead of those guys, I only put Carlsson and Gavrikov ahead of them. And Gavrikov is at least 2 seasons away.
Behind those two we really only have Harrington, Peeke and Collins.