I agree with you Rik, but his numbers will improve. Coming off a big injury he will have rust. That said, 1 dimensional player is 1 dimensional. End result is still the same. It would be great to be able to keep him, but that $5M cap hit next year... let's put it this way, he'd better get up to .8 pts per game or he's likely a goner.
Yup, that was a Wang, back end loaded special. Who would take him with that hit unless he was scoring 30+?
I can't give much attention to his projected +/- on a 5 game sample during a period that the team got destroyed with 17 goals in 3 of those games. Talk about small sample size.
What I see with Grabner's record is a decline in shots and shooting % from year 1 to year 2. The year 1 numbers were 228 shots and unsustainable % of 14.9. Garth should have known that that was not sustainable. In year 2 he drops to 178 shots And his shooting % comes back to earth, 11.5%.
In the lockout season he plays 45 games, has 108 shots (close to 200 over a full season), and a 14.5 shooting percentage.
Last year was his only terrible year. Had 12 goals on 137 shots (extrapolated to 175 shots over the full season) and had a brutal 8.8 shooting %. But he was the leading goal scorer in the entire Olympics for Austria.
All this tells me is that Grabs has a good deal of inconsistency but had one bad season and can contribute value to the team.
I am not going to judge his extrapolated +/- over a season on 5 f the teams worst GA games. his defensive play is more than adequate and the player is a tweeter......between 2nd/3rd line.
No matter what, Garth will hold him this year for a playoff run depth, and next year his cap hit will almost assure that he remains unmoved.
We have to hope (not without prior evidence) that he returns to 200 shot/14% shooter. That doesn't happen by accident.