Has Rielly not emerged as a #1 defenseman under Babcock? Has Dermott not developed into a top four guy?
Rielly was a top-4 D with lots of experience before Babcock arrived (an extremely dedicated D improved between the age of 21 and 25. Oh my has that ever happened before?). Dermott is a young D who entered the league in an extremely sheltered 3rd pairing role and 21 months later has not progressed past an extremely sheltered 3rd pairing role. The few times where circumstances have resulted in him being moved up the lineup it has not been successful. This is Babcock’s 18th year in the NHL. During that time his top-4 Ds were either inherited (such as Lidstrom, Rielly) or acquired (Zaitsev, Barrie etc). That is astounding, and not in a good way.
What are you on about? Sandin over the 2 games has been getting the sheltered minutes ever young defenseman should get. If Sandin can't handle those minutes well then he clearly wasn't ready for the NHL and will hopefully get sent down if he continues to play the way he did tonight and Wednesday for that matter. He had a few blunders during the opener too.
No young D should ever be brought into the NHL sheltered like this.
Top-4 D in the league basically entered the league in a couple different ways:
They played low minutes in their debut year (but by low we are talking 14 – 17 minutes a game – usually as call ups during the second half of their debut season) and eventually became top-4 D. This has rarely happened and these D were older and had lots of big minute experience (ie hundreds of games playing against men in the SHL, KHL, AHL, college etc) and in some situations were not expected to become top-4 D, but circumstances changed that. Kempny, Greene, Gustafsson, Gudas (all 22 – 26 years old their first NHL game).
They were sheltered because they play on a team with a really strong top-end D and it was difficult to crack the lineup. Anaheim had been an example of that. They were shuffled between the AHL and NHL and played fewer than 30 NHL games in their debut season. But even still – in these examples that people claim that this sheltering of the D was extremely beneficial – they played when they were in the NHL lineup. Manson played more than 18 minutes a game for his 28 games. Montour played more than 17 minutes a game for his 27 games. Theodore more than 19 minutes a game for his 19 games.
They played very low minutes (usually under 12) because either they were not ready or the coach didn’t trust them so they were sent down for a year or more until they could play a top-4 role in the NHL. This usually happened after a game or two. Chabot, Gostisbehere, Ekholm, Letang, Giordano.
They played big minutes right off the bat (this is the case for probably 80% of top-4 D). If they became #1 D they usually played top pairing minutes right from the start. If they became #2 D they usually played second pairing minutes right from the start. If they became 2nd pairing D they usually played at least 16 or 17 minutes a game. Doughty, Keith, Heiskanen, Brodin, Faulk, Trouba, MEV, McAvoy, Fowler, Provorov, Sererson, Klingberg, Ekblad, Gardiner, Hamonic, Schultz, Johnson, Dahlin, Slavin, Werenski, Hedman, Carlo, Larsson, Niskanen, Petry, Yandle, Karlsson, Subban, Bouwmeester and Seabrook among others all played at least 20 minutes a game during their debut season.
They played very few minutes in a super sheltered role but they stuck in the lineup and eventually after a year or two they became top-4 D. Examples of this are – none. Of course there are none. It is a completely moronic idea that everyone knows is completely moronic, until they start using motivated reasoning to convince themselves of nonsense because they want to believe that their coach and team are acting intelligently instead of extremely stupidly.
Having a 19 year old D in the lineup playing 11 minutes a game makes zero sense. Any journeyman D can capably fill that role.
Being hung up about mistakes made a young D is beyond idiotic and completely counterproductive. The best way for a young D with top-4 potential to enter the NHL and actually reach their potential is to be thrown in – big minutes, PP and/or PK – encourage them to play their game, make mistakes and then learn from those mistakes. Either adjust to the speed, size and intensity of the NHL over the first dozen games or so, or not (and get sent down).
The absolute worst way for a young D with top-4 potential to enter the NHL is to be in a low minute, lengthy stretches on the bench, paranoid about making mistakes and the consequences that will come from the coach for those, not playing the game the same way they have always played, lose their creativity and stop testing their limits on the ice. You don't learn and improve playing 11 minutes a game. The Leafs organization knows this, but they have Babcock as the coach. Everyone else knows this when it comes to young D being deployed this way on any other team.
The quicker Sandin is sent down the better. Hopefully he can then move back to the AHL and carry on what he accomplished last season without missing a beat. The longer Sandin stays before being sent down, the more likely the chances are that he has a wasted season in the AHL as well.