I don't like to say things that I wouldn't want the player to read in this day and age too much, but the two dumbest prospects in my recollection were mcbain and boychuk. there was nothing going on behind the eyes of those two. talented as all hell. mcbain was on those wisconsin clubs that had just amazing defense and he looked every bit as good as those other guys at the time. he was pretty soft as well and in the league at that time, you couldn't show any weakness to that type of game or they'd relentlessly go after you. every time mcbain touched the puck in his own zone the forechecker would just wallop him because it took him entirely out of the game. he didn't have an iota of fight back in him. after a concussion or two, all the effort to look competitive went away and he started turning out of hits and losing races on purpose to not arrive at the puck in time to have to go shoulder to shoulder with anyone into the corners. that was when you really knew it was over.
as far as ruutu goes, if you didn't love him you didn't love the game at the time. he had a 3 year run that was remarkable. he had 307 hits in a year he scored 57 points. I don't know if you'll ever see that again. part of me felt like he truly left something on the table by being as obsessed with the physical element of the game that took so much out of his body and kept him injured the majority of his career. looking back, it's hard to think of another hurricane that was as successful in altering the game from both a scoring perspective and a physical perspective. scott walker was up there too. the thing about ruutu is just how crazy talented he was and he didn't have to play that style to be useful, he just wanted to play that way. he could have been an annual 60-70 point guy in my mind if not better had he focused on being more selective with the physical game, but he only had one speed. he will forever in my mind be underrated. scored 23 goals in his 20 year old season for the Hawks back when it was exceedingly rare for rookies to come in and pot 20. one of my favorite players of all time. will always remember his debut game when he jumped on the bench. patrik elias high sticked him twice intentionally and the second one carved him up. hated elias after that for the rest of his career. you can even see it in the video after ruutu trucked elias he gave this little nod like he took that number. then on a dump in, elias disguised a high stick so well that the trail official didn't even call it initially. he crossed his body with his stick and on the way up, just raked the blade edge across tuomo's face. I had been watching elias since the hit when I was at the game and he cared more about chasing ruutu around than winning. should have been a game misconduct.
