I wasn't a big fan of the pick. Him and the Yamamoto pick are too high risk for my tastes.
Don't like his lack of scoring.
Heard his speed isn't great.
No nhl shot and even average speed is not a good combo for a productive nhl career. He's not big either.
After saying all that negative... He has surpassed all my expectations and got his career back on track. He was a long shot prospect that honestly didn't show anything impressive in his injury studded time in junior. His ahl numbers and play is impressive and exactly where it needs to be to offset that injury riddled unspectacular career to date.
To be perfectly honest there doesn't seem to be much of rhyme or reason for what skills/players need to make a successful jump to the nhl with.
He is back on track. Keeping expectations reasonable I'm really looking forward to him and Maxismov maybe being a dynamic duo next year in the AHL rather than him making the nhl roster next year.
Primarily because of his injury history I think it makes sense to be given another full year in the AHL before seriously giving him a real look at the nhl level. Two impressive injury free years in a stable environment "could" really be exactly what is needed to develop him "best".
As good as he has been he turns 21 in a few months so it's definitely more on track than "he's omfg amazing".
If he somehow pushes his way on to the nhl team obviously that's great but if I was predicting a good development path for him it would be.
Strong finish this year regular season plus a deep successful playoff run. Hopefully scoring more.
A big offseason where he trains crazy hard without injury. Improves his skating and shooting particularly. Intense offseason strength and skill training sometimes makes a players career.
Next year going from impressive ahl rookie to dominate ahl softmore is a lot harder than it sounds.
I don't know why but I always think of David Krejci when I think of Benson. Career wise Benson is a long ways off what Krejci managed to do at the same point.
Currently I think if everything goes great that is Bensons ceiling.
A long and hard road before we are talking about this guy actually helping our team win. 3 years before that happens, if it happens, seems optimistic.
