Quote:
Originally Posted by Swayze11
#1 thing I hate about Sutter is every year he preaches that we need to have 1-3 players from the farm up on the big squad, yet we never see it.
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Lombardi, Boyd, Moss, Giordano, Phaneuf, Pardy, Nystrom, McElhinney all say hi. John Armstrong likely would have made the Flames already if not for injuries.
Some years the prospects on the farm win their spots, some years they don't. Sutter isn't saying he hands spots to prospects every year, he has them compete for spots.
In Van der Gulik's case in fact, he was a victim of his own poor training camps. You can go find quotes on him from previous camps, he disappointed and failed to ever win a role.
Sutter has already gone on record this week saying the Flames will give every opportunity this fall to guys like Mikael Backlund, Brett Sutter, John Armstrong, John Negrin and Matt Pelech
at the expense of veterans. If they fail to win their roles, a veteran stays. If they impress, they can force trades/movement.
Not sure where this perception that we never use farmhands is. I think it has more to do with the fact that the cupboard was fairly bare when Sutter came aboard and we didn't even have a farm team. Its taken him a few years to restock the system and thus the quality of young players we've had competing for roles has been pretty mediocre the last few years.
Our farm system is now at the point where I think we can expect more impact players to be developed.
Did you want Sutter to hand DVG a role regardless of his training camp performance?