Not sold on him. All his goals are scored as tip ins, simply because he’s a big guy and can easily dominate the front of the net in these leagues. Won’t be the case in pros. We shouldn’t have wasted a pick on a guy who at best will turn out to be a poor man’s Holmstrom.
At best a poor man's Holmstrom!?!
You do know that Homer was an awful skater, couldn't pass well for the first half of his career, wasn't a face-off guy, was poor defensively, and was 6 inches shorter and 20lbs lighter than Rasmussen is already when at his biggest.
Rasmussen is already better than Homer in terms of most of the above, and Homer put up more than 0.5ppg over 1000 games. Rasmussen isn't flashy, isn;t particularly exciting, and probably will never be elite. But if he has luck with injuries, the early signs are that he could have a very productive NHL career, particularly as his maturity, work ethic and focus are all constantly talked up by all observers, thus increasing his chances of improvement.
Given that we haven't had a really good net front guy since Homer, if Ras can translate his skill in that area to the NHL, while remaining a pretty good skater, defensively responsible, winning face-offs and being an ok set-up guy, he may be a huge asset to us.
At worse it will allow Mantha to play to his strengths on the PP rather than being re-cast simply because he is big!