Juolevi started the season paired with Chatfield. I believe the feeling was he should be able to carry an undrafted, energetic, hard working, second year D-man allowing every pairing to have either an experienced or high level developing player who needed to show his ability to carry a heavy load. The Juolevi/Chatfield pairing was a disaster. Chatfield needs a vet! Juolevi ended up revealing he had to be sheltered big time in order to have him available for the power play and was paired with the team's most capable defensive veteran D-man, Sifers, and he was still everything you, other Vancouver posters who watched his Utica games, and the Utica posters who were right on top of him have described since he first stepped onto the ice in Utica.
People claiming he was getting better and if not injured, would have got his game up to at least standard for the AHL. are wrong. Those statements are purely speculative and seem to be based upon one factor and one factor alone and that factor would be the only positive you can attach to him, 13 points in 18 games played.
Before he got injured his defensive game was getting worse game by game, not better. Probably getting the snot knocked out of him and flattened to the ice by a forechecker along the half boards and having to have Sifers step up and attack the guy and after the penalties were served Arseneau went after the guy again, might have contributed even more to his already determined effort to stay away from contact. After that he never even tried to initiate any physicality on his own in any area of the ice in his own end let alone anywhere else in the rink. He never even leaned on an opponent. Stick check was his most aggressive move. The guy not only continued to play a soft game, but actually assessed, on the fly, where and when he might encounter contact and made an obvious effort to avoid it.
I hope his supporters in this discussion get their wish and Benning instructs Green and Co. to give him every possible chance to make the Canucks roster. Sifers has retired. If McEneny is for some some reason re-signed (he is currently a UFA) after yet another season ending knee injury/operation/ rehab, he will be playing on less than one leg. That will make Sautner the team's most "veteran D-man". Dylan Blujus has played a few more AHL games, but he is only on an AHL contract and has thus, been used in the Biega role in Utica, the #7 D-man. Add these 2 guys to Brisebois and Chatfield and you will have 4 defenders who have played at least 2 seasons. Then we have 3 rookies in Eliot, Rafferty, and Teves. That would mean Sautner, Blujus, and Brisebois get to carry 3 of the others and none are the defensive stalwarts that Juolevi needed to stay afloat while still going -12 in in his 18 GP. I know +/- can be misleading, but in his case and I can assure you he was a or the prime contributor on most of those goals. He gave 2 pucks directly to the high pk guy for breakaway goals and specialty play goals don't figure in on +/- stats. All you had to do to get him to cough up the puck was make a beeline for him and threw it away to avoid the collision that was coming.
He actually needs a real strong veteran defender like Biega or Schenn. If he is sent here again without a player of that caliber, it could end up even worse than last time. Benning has a real habit of sending prospects to Utica without the essential parts they need to succeed.
He can pass with the best at any level when he has time and space. His passes are tape to tape no matter the length of the pass. He, however, did not walk the blue line to open a lane for his own shot or give him even better targets for a pass. These few issues account for why 12 of his 13 points were assists. Perfect feeds for Boucher's killer one timer on the PP got him a few of them.
IMO his play here did not cause me to believe I was watching a future everyday NHL D-man and the #5 OA moniker was difficult to fathom.. He doesn't have just a few wrinkles to work out. It's not just a lack of confidence. His interviews reveal an almost arrogant belief in himself. It's not just adjusting to the smaller rink, though that has made the physical part of the North American game a lot more difficult for him to avoid because players are on him much faster than he is accustomed to. It's not strength, since he has never exhibited the employment of such an asset anyways. Good puck handlers go by him like he's a pylon in stick handling drills and lesser skilled guys drop their shoulders down and hold the puck out wide of his poke check and muscle their way past him. That indicates a skating weakness. The fact that he doesn't take the puck and skate it out of trouble at least once in a while reveals another skating question. This kid has an actual North American pro game to assemble. His European style will not assimilate to the small ice, physicality, and increased speed of the NA pro game and all of these issues will be magnified in the NHL.
That's kind of a synopsis of my past posts on this player. I don't believe I have anything more to add that hasn't been posted before.
