Hmm...used to think? Bergevin signed Alzner last year and thought he'd make us better.
You're right, the stay at home big Dman who isn't that good of a skater is an old man's player. However, Tinordi was drafted almost a decade ago. At the time, teams were still using these guys quite a fair bit.
People didn't expect him to develop puck handling abilities. People wanted him to be a better version of O'Byrne. More sound and intelligent defensively, with better skating abilities, strong on the PK and a presence in his end. That's essentially what people were looking at when speaking of Tinordi. It wasn't about puck handling, passing, skating the puck up, or any offensive aspect of the game.
There is no reason to believe he couldn't have become that better version of O'Byrne. The problem is they either put pressure on him, or let him put that pressure himself, on having to fight all the time. He would literally engage in fights like he was an enforcer, from the faceoffs, with no purpose whatsoever. I remember
@Whitesnake was particularly vocal about how stupid it was for him to fight all the time and then this happened:
A lot of posters here don't understand development. You speak with them and they think being a good development coach would be turning Galchenyuk into Guy Lafleur or making Jacob De La Rose into Kopitar, and because no coach can obviously do that, well darn, development ain't all that important in the end. It shows how ignorant some posters are.
Development is about proper guidance, leading them towards their potential, that's it in a nutshell. It isn't about sending out a voodoo spell and suddenly making a 4th liner into a 1st one.
For Tinordi, there is no reason to believe he could not have made it as a regular bottom pairing Dman. He might have remained in the NHL for just a handful of seasons considering the shift the league has had, but he could have definitely made it imo.
Had management told Tinordi, forget fighting, it's a dying occurrence in the NHL anyways, instead focus on improving your positioning, work on the ability of cutting down space and directing players into the areas you want them in. Don't waste time practicing balance skills for when you fight or doing boxing lessons. That's time wasted on a completely unimportant aspect of the game and it takes it away from other areas of need. Furthermore, mentally, it is way way way less demanding knowing you don't have to get into scraps where you can get your face bashed in at any moment.
