I was always cautious regarding this player. You don't have the issues he's had without some risk of recurrence or the guy just being an escapist flake. You go year to year with someone like this because they require that continual motivation.
Kass fooled the Oilers for one season, won the lottery, now he's back to doing jackshit. With or without substance issues the guy is useless. He's got considerable baggage, plays in a sport where everybody know's he's a joke and the big problem with sobriety is you start acknowledging all the wrong crazy shit you used to do. That's the real weird time of sobriety when you realize that you are a complete jackass, have been, and that you have to come to terms with that.
This is the paradox double edge sword of an out of control ex alcoholic, substance abuser, that found it easy to be crazy on the ice when he was half crazed himself. (Simply put, but I could go into more detail. ) The trouble is you remove some of that crazy, the lifestyle issues, and the same guy starts dialing it down because they are not the same person that did crazy shit. You probably all know someone like that. Life of the party but alone are the death of themselves.
Think about Ozzy Osbourne sober and you kind of get the picture. At least when he was drunk and high all the time it kind of explains the slurred speech and stumbling and random antics. When you get sober its depressing because all the deleterious shit is just real. its not temporary, its not due to being high, its what you are now and its never getting better. You're not the same, you feel embarrassed to pull the same crap.
Its a common enough dynamic. Just that you don't see it a lot in pro sports as the substance issues are often masked and or persist throughout the playing career. The worst thing is that Kass will never be what he was without having all the related issues and baggage. He's now trying to be a player that he just isn't. He's trying and thinking of being a skill player. When he does that it just makes it worse because he's more out of his element.
The difficulty for someone like Kass is that according to biographical info he used to be just a very nice youth, kid, ever respectful, even listen to his voice. When people here his voice for the first time they get shocked. Its mild mannered, the complete opposite of his pro sports incarnation. So that Kass is not an inate ahole. He only became that through substance abuse. As soon as that tap turns off the person reverts to something they were before, or tries to. Its different for people that were always aholes and don't need any drugs to be one.
ps these are not excuses, please don't read it that way, I'm just describing what often occurs.