Liminality
Registered User
- Oct 22, 2008
- 13,366
- 4,013
I think I've gotten over the first initial emotions of losing an important game and being mad at Gardiner. Before this game 7, Jake was playing alright for the rest of the games. Not great but maybe average.
So Jake is what he is. He's a defender with excellent tools and is great at getting those stretch passes and moving the puck in the offensive. A good offensive D man. I still think he does these plays that make it harder for himself, doesn't make the simple play and seems to give the opponents an opportunity to burn him. He's not quick at getting the puck out of the zone under pressure and seems to struggle with his defensive zone awareness sometimes. He can be physical on the boards sometimes but in front of the net I don't think he does too much.
If we keep Gardiner, we need to limit his minutes. I'm not fully convinced that Dermott can step right in and produce like Gardiner could but I do like how Dermott makes these quick plays to transition from the d zone to neutral zone (he did have some big turnovers in the playoffs still). Problem seems to be that we need another defender that can eat up minutes with Rielly on the top pair to ease the minutes that Gardiner and Zaitsev seem to be getting.
This is a huge what if and probably impossible to answer with how uncertain we are with how we'll look next season, what looks better as our defense?
Rielly-Hainsey/trade/UFA
Gardiner-Zaitsev
Dermott-Hainsey/trade/UFA
or
Rielly-Hainsey/trade/UFA
Dermott-Zaitsev
Rosen/Borgman-Hainsey/trade/UFA
Hainsey is a stop gap until we find a real top pairing RD clearly. I still think Gardiner can be a part of this team but maybe that changes when he needs a new contract in 2019-2020. He's still a pretty good top 4 d option for now.
So Jake is what he is. He's a defender with excellent tools and is great at getting those stretch passes and moving the puck in the offensive. A good offensive D man. I still think he does these plays that make it harder for himself, doesn't make the simple play and seems to give the opponents an opportunity to burn him. He's not quick at getting the puck out of the zone under pressure and seems to struggle with his defensive zone awareness sometimes. He can be physical on the boards sometimes but in front of the net I don't think he does too much.
If we keep Gardiner, we need to limit his minutes. I'm not fully convinced that Dermott can step right in and produce like Gardiner could but I do like how Dermott makes these quick plays to transition from the d zone to neutral zone (he did have some big turnovers in the playoffs still). Problem seems to be that we need another defender that can eat up minutes with Rielly on the top pair to ease the minutes that Gardiner and Zaitsev seem to be getting.
This is a huge what if and probably impossible to answer with how uncertain we are with how we'll look next season, what looks better as our defense?
Rielly-Hainsey/trade/UFA
Gardiner-Zaitsev
Dermott-Hainsey/trade/UFA
or
Rielly-Hainsey/trade/UFA
Dermott-Zaitsev
Rosen/Borgman-Hainsey/trade/UFA
Hainsey is a stop gap until we find a real top pairing RD clearly. I still think Gardiner can be a part of this team but maybe that changes when he needs a new contract in 2019-2020. He's still a pretty good top 4 d option for now.