What if Gáborík played in the dead puck era?

[Jarick]

Count me among the others who wouldn't see much difference. He's an opportunistic player but very one-dimensional and therefore streaky. If the D gives him space, he's lethal. If he gets played physical, he's less effective. And overall he's very fragile. I have one jersey with a player's name on it and it's Gaborik, but I'm honest enough that I can't see him being a 50-60 goal player if he was drafted five years later.

 

[Zolik37]

Gaborik is a very, very soft, injury prone player. He'd get manhandled out there.

lol, this guy never miss a chance to bash slovak player.

 

[I Hate Blake Coleman]

He'd the still be the overrated, injury prone winger who's glorified and seen as better than he actually is as he has always been.

 

[jcbio11]

Well he did play in the dead puck era and he did just fine.

What would prime Bondra or Palffy do in today's NHL is a much more intriguing question for me.

 

[jcbio11]

I think he'd be the same type of player. Not overly responsible on the defensive end. Not very good in the postseason. Injury prone. Never a top 10 player in the game (top 15?). Soft. Not much would change.

I am thinking you don't watch him a lot? He's just fine defensively (go read the Rangers board where you'll see people claiming he is often better defensively than some of their players who are actually responsible for defense) and claiming he is "soft" is a strange complain about his game. He does not shy away from physical contact, occasionally body checks, always grabs his guy after the whistle etc. Do you want him to throw body crushing body checks ala Chara or Pronger or what?