While there is some truth to the over hyping of Poehling's offensive potential I would say that you are equally guilty of the opposite in limiting him to a 30 point ceiling.
I still see a 45-60 point ceiling for him with a strong two way game. He is very good at tipping pucks and when he adds some man strength he could potentially be a handful in front of the net on the pp.
Hopefully he is putting the work in to reach that ceiling.
Yeah I think some are just over counter-weighting some of the crazy hype with the low ball expectations.
As much as I wanted to see a big leap in his offensive production in his D+2 year, I still saw significant improvement in his game. He really started to make skill plays at high speeds which stood out to me.
I don't think there's star upside but real impact for us? I think so. But I mean sheer upside.
I have to admit I'm a bit concerned whether he can get back on track. When you hear CJ talking up KK and Suzuki when they first hit the bubble and no mention of Poehling, it was a bit concerning. Especially with the rumours floating around about laziness or whatever. Take them with a grain of salt but many times where there's smoke, there's fire. Him not even getting a sniff at our 4th line was telling too.
I think Poehling's going to be one of Bouchard's first real tests or maybe a better word is 'project'. I believe we should think long and hard about trying him out on the wing. His size and overall game, best case scenario, could really help out our top 9. As much as we need another true trigger man, I think he could be great with KK or Suzuki who have great shots themselves.