Quote:
Originally Posted by Textcritic
By all counts, Bennet will not be playing any hockey until he is completely healthy, so I'm not entirely sure where you are going with this. Will he need to be a standout to pick up a regular shift? Yes. Whether or not he can remains to be seen, but it seems foolish to simply dismiss this as a possibility out of hand.
"Re-injury risk"? This is a red herring. Again, there WILL BE NO RISK because the Flames will not let him play until the injury is completely healed. By all counts, the shoulder is ALREADY in better shape now than before he had surgery.
I generally agree with this, except for the belief that the team would be reticent to see Bennett in a limited role or in the press box "even a few games." A few games of low activity is not going to have any detrimental long term effect. Nevertheless, in no way do I see how this in any way conflicts with the notion that he should and will get games in the AHL and with the Flames this spring to demonstrate his readiness before (if?) he is sent back to Kingston.
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Consider that a shoulder can take a lot longer to heal than what the actual recovery time is listed as. There's a mental aspect to it in addition to a strength and range of motion concern that will likely be a non factor by now. Its something that is going to be totally dependent on the player and yes, it is not a stretch to say that a young, smallish rookie who is coming off a major injury is a re-injury risk. Shoulder recurrence or other injuries can pop up due simply to lack of playing time and overall fitness levels. This is nothing new, you see it all the time in this league when players have been out long term.
Obviously Bennett will be medically cleared to play but there's no way to be NHL ready at this point in the year if you haven't been playing games anywhere. For a raw rookie to jump in and take away a top 9 spot from one of the established players on this team (who are all playing very well) would be nothing short of a miracle at this stage in the season.
I for one think we have seen enough proof up north to reinforce the notion that it's a much safer and effective to er on the side of caution with your top prospects instead of putting them in a position to fail. Bennett isn't going to be the difference between the Flames making the playoffs or not in 2015. Why not set him up to play a ton in the CHL and move him along from there as needed? This is the time he needs to be playing a lot of hockey.