Quote:
Originally Posted by 868904
Sieloff is different from all of those guys, he brings an element that none of them do and that is truculence.
Some on this board see zero need for any physicality but hockey is still a physical game. I think you would like to have at least one physical type defensive defenceman in your rotation.
Guys like Anderson/Kylington/Culkin/Kulak/Morrison/Hickey will be fighting each other for the 3,4, and 5 spot.
Guys like Sieloff, Kanzig, Ollas Mattson, and Bruce will be fighting for the 6 and 7 spot.
Ideally, if there's a guy who can fill both roles, that would be perfect, but I don't think the Flames have anyone like that in their system, maybe Rafikov is the closest.
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The problem with Sieloff is that he's very average in most ways and while he does bring physicality, he doesn't have a lot of size to go along with that. A player like Engelland is also fairly average in a lot of ways, but he has the size to go with the physicality. On defense you can't really have players that are just average in all areas. There needs to be some sector where they are well above average, otherwise you can just go sign someone like Diaz and say Schelmko for 1 million and get an upgrade over that player. You can handle having a forward that is very average as the 12th/13th forward without issue. The problem there is that the Flames have so many forwards that converting him wouldn't make a ton of sense.
He needs to improve either in a couple specific areas or overall this season or he will get pushed out due to having so much depth. Whether he does that or not is up to him really, and I do like him and wish that he could figure those things out because he does seem like a good leader to have in the room. We won't know though until the season progresses. At worst he'll be moved like the Flames dealt Reinhart last week.