Hodgson is going to have trouble being a successful top 6 center on a winning team unless he can completely revamp his defensive play. A lottery team like Buffalo can afford to feed him minutes even though he's a liability but once they have designs on actually competing they're going to have to weigh his pros and cons and a less offensively gifted center might be taking his ice time. The points are nice I'm sure, but they're not all that useful if you're one of the worst defensive centers in the league. He may be able to improve, but it's not something he's shown a desire to work on in his 3 years of pro hockey. If anything he's getting worse.
Targeting Kassian may prove to be a mistake for the Canucks (it's still years too early to determine that), but keeping Hodgson simply wasn't an option given what Hodgson and his camp were after. Even if you completely discount anything Gillis has said about dealing with Hodgson's camp, this is a guy whose dad called up and hassled Eliotte Friedman because he didn't like what Friedman said about him on HNIC. I imagine negotiating an extension this summer with those guys will be fun for Regier. I wouldn't be surprised if we see another O'Reilly type situation.
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