Quote:
Originally Posted by Rick M.
Will our goon's beating the opposition goon give Johnny more room to wheel? No. When players take liberties with our stars, we need to push back in kind. We don't seem to have players who will do this. When a Kassian/Bieksa/Burrows hammers a Gaudreau/Hudler/Byron, someone needs to hammer a Sedin. It's as simple as that: if you take liberties with our best players, we will return the favor. You don't need goons to do that, just hard hitters.
|
I do think goons still have a role, although much smaller. How many times last year did we see Monahan getting messed with only to have Grats jump over the boards on the next shift and exchange some words? Unfortunately Grats hasn't been in the lineup to do that, and when he was in the lineup, he hasn't been doing it.
I was really wishing that Bollig would be an upgrade on Grats, worse at fighting but better at hockey. Unfortunately he's bad at both, rarely even throws a big hit.
On the second half of your post though I still agree 100%. Luckily we seem to have lots of these guys in the pipeline.
Or we need to find a way to add a foot to Paul Byron.