Majorityof1
Registered User
I mean I understand your point and I think there would be merit if this trend continued, but the dude hasn't played an NHL game in 2 years. He's never going to be a defensive stalwart but we ought to wait for more information to become available before making a hard stance on him as a player.
Perunovich had 20 points in 22 games in the AHL last year (not indicative but that's pretty good for a defenseman) and he had 8 points in 10 games at the WC. The guy can obviously score and if we're not going to be good at defense then f*** it let him play. Krug didn't look bad through a few games defensively, but he didn't keep that up just based on the eye test and was pretty awful last night (everyone was). Personally, I'll make comments about how some players are playing or what I saw from the game on that night, but I'm not going to make broad claims about a player until they've played something like ~15 games in that respective season.
I think the reason why people argue with you about this is because there's nothing at stake. There's absolutely nothing to lose by playing Perunovich this year. Plenty of players have played 100+ games in this league and not been replacement level players and at this point in the Blues construction, I think it's fine to attempt to develop the player. Each time you make a case about his numbers, none of us will disagree they are bad, but the same question will be asked: What is really at stake? The answer is going to be ubiquitously "Nothing."
If there is nothing at stake and we don't care about how bad we are, why does everyone bitch so much?
What do we have to lose? Developing Tucker who is in the press box and is young enough he can develop, developing Alexandrov who is in the press box so we can run 7 D to shelter Perunovich. Boosting Vrana's trade value by not scratching him to run 7 D. Giving Kessel or Loof those sheltered minutes to see what we have in them. Perunovich is 25. If he doesn't amount to anything now, when will he? He is almost half-way through what should be his prime (23-28) and people are still trying to develop him.