Leafs have very little grit in their line up presently. Obviously Chevy values him to put a claim in. Maybe Dubas will learn teams need gritty players too one day. It’s remarkable he has made the leafs even softer with this move.
You seem to be going out of your way to convince yourself grit doesn’t matter in hockey today. Regardless it is a no risk move by the Jets. They got a nhl player for nothing that fits in towards their brand of hockey. Not sure why you are upset unless you do recognize the leafs have gotten even softer.
Not going to get into a philosophical debate on grit vs skill. All I will say is look at the brand of hockey that st louis played last year that won the cup. That will shut down that discussion pretty quick. Shore was deemed valuable enough by a gm known for good talent evaluation. Its a zero risk move by tre jets. Not sure why you feel it’s relevant to tell jets fans gritty players that play heavy hockey do not matter? Leafs are doubling down on zero grit in their line up. Thus far they have gotten progressively worse under dubas with this untested model. So jets have nothing to lose here and we will see if leafs doubling down on less grit works or fails.
I love the idea of a tougher team. But, Nick Shore was simply the worst roster forward the Leafs iced this season. The other thing is that he's not a very gritty player. I've watched every game and have whined about the lack of physicality all season long and if they didn't waive Shore I would question their thought process. As has been mentioned all the other forwards have been noticeable and made a impact. Shore was vanilla, he actually scored well on faceoffs in comparison to career norms and had a small presence on the PK. But, he was useless 5 on 5 and his shot count was ugly.
Honestly, the entire 4th line is pretty ineffective.
That's a little outdated in terms of the Jets identity. We have one player who plays a heavy style in Lowry and then we lost probably half of our heaviness in Byfuglien.
