Your entire argument really seems to be "Sprong did stuff he should be expected to do and ZAR isn't a skilled player, therefore Sprong was better". That's really what I'm reading here. What did Sprong do that isn't stuff that should be expected from him? Oh wow, he made a couple of nice passes. He was a PPG player in the AHL last year and is the organization's best prospect, there's a problem if he can't make a couple of nice passes. Your bar for Sprong is so absurdly low, you're basically giving him credit for being talented and not ****ing himself on the ice. You're criticizing ZAR because he's not Sprong.
Want to give ZAR an actual criticism, instead of complaining that he's not a skilled player? Point out how he had 1 hit in the preseason. Point out how he was very slow. Point out how he wasn't playing physical. That is what he brings, to criticize him because he's not dangling around defenseman is insanely disingenuous. You're giving Sprong credit for things he doesn't deserve credit for, and knocking ZAR for things that he doesn't deserve to be knocked for.
What did ZAR do outside of his 3 assists? What did Sprong do outside of what should be expected of him with his talent level? Talent does not equal performance, Sprong having the talent to make plays in the offensive zone doesn't mean he performed better than someone who doesn't have that talent. That's what it really comes down to here, you're either cherrypicking things to say positive about Sprong or your bar for him is on the floor low. No one should be satisfied with him making a nice pass once a game. No one should be satisfied that he skated fast with the puck in one of the games, making a defenseman retreat in the defensive zone. This is Pouliot-apologist level stuff here, Sprong should be held to a higher standard than that.
Sprong is a skill player that displayed his raw skills, what is ZAR? A plugger that struggles to even get from point A-B and you think this is... a good thing?
What were you honestly even seeing from him? He’s so bad in space it’s concerning as hell..
There are guys who can play that simple straight ahead game and bang bodies in the A already, like TDP most especially and Haggerty, and do it more effectively that what I’m sure we are seeing from ZAR.
So ya, I’m looking at his skill set to see if he brings something different tons of other pluggers don’t, and I am not seeing them.
I already pointed out he was slow and terrible in space, which is where he will be most of the time in the NHL game. A guy like Hornqvist has sneaky wheels, despite the knocks on his skating. ZAR doesn’t even have that
And you want to exaggerate that Sprong made one skilled play a game, which is BS, but you know what, that’s more than ZAR made the entire preseason.
Name one skill play he even made...
Late in the third period yesterday ZAR had the puck coming down the LHB and the defender started to pivot his inside foot to cover the backdoor because his partner was trailing behind his assignment...
I thought for sure even ZAR could get the corner, but holy f*** dude... he’s so slow that the defender recovered from that and pushed him harmlessly to the corner.
Yet you don’t notice stuff like that and get concerned?
Yet we are suppose to be seeing how he outplayed Sprong... it’s nutty, sorry Emp.
Sprong and Simon both need to show a lot more, but at least you can see something there... ZAR isn’t showing anything to get us excited and I doubt his feet are going to magically get better.
You just can't hate the Caps. It's like the Steelers hating the Browns. It just can't happen. Washington finally got one punch in on our fight. Good for them. They've been knocked down 8 times. It's like a little brother getting one up on you have 200 tries. Good for them.
