Copied from the general discussion board:
Lindström is soooo much better than when he went to Colorado.
Sure that season he racked up a lot of points and was the top point scorer and 2nd goal scorer (28 g 60 a in 53 gp) in the SHL, but no one can say he dominated the ice or was even close to be the best player in the league. I mean neither before nor after 11 points in 18 play-off games he was even in the discussion for a place on a WC team.
It was a Martin St. Louis type of situation, best at scoring points but not the overall MVP best player, you wouldn't take St. Louis over Crosby or similar player that can dominate the ice.
So him not being that good in Colorado - no surprise.
He came back, and was about as good as before. Great with the puck, scored goals, but soft, sort of medium-slow and not very high aggressiveness, intensity and defensive awareness.
Same thing 2012-13 season, but you saw flashes of a play where he could dominate at times. But not nearly enough to be a serious contender for a WC roster spot.
But then something happened. The 13-14 season he came back way faster, way more aggressive, stronger on the puck and only became better defensively as the season went on. He started to look like a lock on the WC roster. I mean he was pretty clearly the best player in the league.
And in the play-offs he had a 1,5 pts/game average which is almost unheard of in the SHL, I think the points record is 23 points in 20 games, he had 18 points after 13 games, best pts/gp-average ever for a player to win the SHL playoffs and was TRULY dominating every game. And by the way Colby Armstrong played in the SHL this season scoring 20 points in 47 games (1 in 10 play off games) against Jocke's 81 points in 67. And now he looked like a lock for a top 6 spot on the WC team.
And after dominating the Sweden pre-WC games he went into the WC as a clear first liner, holding Gustav Nyquist out of the 1st line and the 1st PP on the basis that at the WC level on big ice he is clearly the better player. Not in the NHL game, but in the game that's played in the WC he was undisputably better. Which might or might not translate.
With a groin injury that made him miss half the game against Canada (in which he scored) and the game against Italy (where the other players competing for the internal points win scored 4 points), he scored 4 points against Czech Republic in 2 games, and on our only goal against Russia. So 5+6 in 8,5 games missing the one game where it was easy to score points.
So it wasn't like he accumulated points against the weaker nations, he was involved in almost every goal we scored against the Czechs, Canadians and Russians. He waaay overshadowed regular NHLers like Gustav Nyquist and Mikael Backlund through the tournament.
I mean if you had special studied him in the World Championship against NHL competition level players (Canada and Russia games at least) you'd have seen that there is potential. Won't say that he will realize the potential, but he overshadowed every NHLer he played against. Including Ovie and Malkin in the game against Russia.
So people saying "what kind of development can a player have from 28 to 30"... Well, he's gone from a pure scorer with no redeeming values who's not even been close to the WC to the dominating SHL player and by far the best WC player, and that's in ONE year.
I think he said, paraphrased "I realized that the talent can only take me so far, and to be my best I had to train better, which has made me much faster and stronger, and all-around better".
He's a completely different player with a completely different mindset now. That's why he's gone to a top scorer regular season that disappears in the SHL play-offs and is nowhere near the National Squad to the play off dominator and World Championship dominator first line lock.
What this will translate to in the NHL is uncertain. He might be a flop again. But on the big ice and SHL/SHL playoffs he's gone from just a scorer to a total hockey player. And the best Swedish player in the World Championships. It will be so interesting to see, because his sick development last year, I wasn't even sure it would translate to the WC, but he was as good against Canada and Russia as in the SHL. And those two teams has ONLY NHL-level players. So it's just the rink size that's the question, the competition he can handle. I mean he scored half a point per game in Phoenix and in those days he wasn't half the player he is now.
I for myself hope he flops, since he's on Skellefteå contract in the SHL and that is my team. And they have 2 straight SHL wins and Le Mat (SHL Stanley Cup equivalent) wins. Before he came to Colorado and also the year he came back from Colorado they were destroyed in the playoffs finals. The last two years his team has destroyed others in the playoffs (I think they lost four games in six 7-game play-off rounds the last couple of years) much because of his sick transition from a guy out of physical shape and bad mentality to faster, stronger and working harder.
