Ogrezilla
Nerf Herder
Its ironic though that we would hate Neal for disappearing in PO and playing great in RS.
do we hate Neal?
Its ironic though that we would hate Neal for disappearing in PO and playing great in RS.
I'd agree, but on this team is a 3rd line winger like Hagelin making 4 million better in the long term than a 3rd line center like Bonino making 3.5. I feel like you can fill in the left side with Kuhn, Wilson, Guentz and Sheary and let Hagelin go. Who exactly is filling our 3C or 4C, and you can go the UFA route, but the only centers I see are players like Boyle, Gagner, Greening, that are all basically worse versions of Bones.
Its ironic though that we would hate Neal for disappearing in PO and playing great in RS.
do we hate Neal?
Bones is playing really bad hockey. Like, really bad. I'd easily pay Boyle or Gagner whatever money Bones wants if Bones doesn't pick it up for the playoffs again.
Maybe Poor choice of words but I know you get my drift
Boyle at 32 for 3x3?
Gagner if he is available will probably want term given he's bounced around.
I don't know. I'm not disagreeing with how bad Bonino has been, it is just one of those situations where the other option isn't necessarily a great one.
the issue with Bonino is that its hard to trust that he's going to always be able to flip that switch. Right now, last year looks like a fluke to me.
Depends on Bones' playoff performance. Before our cup run I felt like Bonino was absolutely terrible then he flipped a switch at some point and completely changed my mind.
What's perplexing is IIRC Bonino was a decent regular season player before Pittsburgh. I know he killed it with Anaheim, they loved him and would welcome him back.. Not sure why he hasn't shown himself here (other than the playoffs)
Keep in mind the year Bonino did well in Anaheim, almost half of his points were on the PP (29 ES, 20 PP). I believe he was used on their top unit. He produced 26 at ES last year for the Pens, so the major difference in production is not playing on the top PP unit.
So I don't think he's ever been a big even strength scoring threat, even during his better years in Anaheim and Vancouver. But he's certainly fallen off a cliff this season even compared to that.
What if he has a playoffs like last year and comes back with a 4.5-5M asking price? Which really isn't that far left field.
Would that really be OK? Because that seems like bat**** insane money for Nick Bonino, to me.
Like has been said, wait for the playoffs. I don't mind him playing half assed in the year if he can be such an integral part of playoff runs annually.
I think people are quick to forget how ****ing awesome he was last spring. And he's only 28 years old.
Not to mention that players sometimes just have down years or periods. It happens to everyone.