I spoke with a couple college/former ECHL'ers after Gaudreau's game against Vancouver (I heard they're no good).
Always interesting to hear the perspective of guys who played at high levels. Anyways, their take was that he had an impressive game but won't be able to take 82 games of contact. They pointed specifically to him getting taken down chasing after the puck with Yannick Weber, said that was a far more dangerous play than it seemed and only a small and inexperienced guy like Gaudreau would get knocked down like that.
A full year in the AHL with some call-up time would probably do him good.
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