eco's bones
Registered User
Personally I was ready to move on from this guy when he went back to his homeland the second time. We drafted him at 6'4 186 and he's still 6'4 186 five years later. He has a lot of skill but you don't get anywhere with the attitude that you can just throw your skates on the ice and that will suffice. No one really makes it if they don't put in the time and the effort and really work for it. He does have a sense of where he should be defensively but I agree with the poster who says he gets routinely outbattled and in the NHL that ain't good. For us this year he got injured and left the game for good early in 3 of his first 4 games. He was way too much on the perimeter of action which is one reason he didn't work out with Panarin because Artemi does a lot of his stuff from the perimeter.....the difference being Panarin can make that shit work for him. But no way two guys on the perimeter on the same line works.
It will be interesting to see how Vitali does in Vancouver because if somebody can get through to him and get him going he could become a very good player. We couldn't do it but that doesn't mean that somebody else won't or the lightbulb will finally go on in his own head. Whatever...I don't think he's going to be a top line forward but I do think he could become a very good middle 6 but he's going to have to really want it and so far he just hasn't shown he wants it enough.
It will be interesting to see how Vitali does in Vancouver because if somebody can get through to him and get him going he could become a very good player. We couldn't do it but that doesn't mean that somebody else won't or the lightbulb will finally go on in his own head. Whatever...I don't think he's going to be a top line forward but I do think he could become a very good middle 6 but he's going to have to really want it and so far he just hasn't shown he wants it enough.