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Originally Posted by EddyBeers
1) Stajan was a beast both nights, he is the only center that has a chance to win a faceoff which is huge for this team. He will never be a true number one center, but he is playing now like a good second line center and is earning his 3.5 million dollar salary. The way he is currently playing, if he kept it up until next December, I would not have a problem re-signing him to a similar contract;
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Stajan has been very good. Nice that Hartley is deploying the only C on the team with the top line.
Quote:
Originally Posted by EddyBeers
2) I thought Bouw was good in both games, he is definitely flourishing under Hartley. He is another guy I would keep long term, as his age and his style of play could make him effective well into his mid to late 30's;
3) Wideman is autrocious 5 on 5, great on the PP, but the guy really needs sheltered minutes otherwise.;
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Bouw is definitely jumping in to the play and creating, which is nice, because he has the skating ability to get back. He is putting a lot more pucks on net as well.
Defensively, rough game last night, he had trouble at various times holding the blue line, and clearing his own zone, and was on for 3 goals against. One he kicks in. Ok, fluky, these things happen. The second, he doesn't even appear to notice as Torres blows past him. And on Phoenix's 4th, he turns the puck over at the half boards, loses the battle for position in front of the net, and it's his guy Johnson that scores.
That guy on the radio last night was talking about the first line being a problem as they were outplayed by the Phoenix 4th line, and saying that Bouw had a really good game.
For all of the talk about how he is on for so many GA because he is playing against the best players, it's not like Crosby, Malkin and Neal scored against his pairing last night, and he was not an innocent bystander on any of the 3.
Someone in the GT said he won a board battle on Iggy's goal. He did astutely jump forward to grab the loose puck and feed it in to the corner. But the battle was Tanguay running a pick on his guy to leave the puck free for Bouw. Credit to him for putting it in a place where Iggy could take over from there.
I guess I look for different things from a defenseman than some people. He played a lot of minutes, ended up +1 and got 5 shots, so that was good for third star.