Quote:
Originally Posted by Textcritic
Kyllington is barely five months younger than Hanifin. It is disingenuous of you to insinuate as though there is an unbridgeable chasm of age between them.
This is wrong on several levels. While Hanifin may not be a better skater than Kyllington, nor bigger than Valimaki he does combine qualities in a single player that surpasses both at this point. It is nonsense for you to suggest that he is not "significantly better than the other two." Andersson and Kyllington draw by far the easiest matchups of all three pairs and frequently get buried. That's okay; they are rookies. But the beauty of Hanifin is that while he is not a rookie, he combines a massive amount of NHL experience at the same age as a NHL rookie. For a soon-to-be 22-year-old second-pairing defenseman Hanifin looks damn good.
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Hanifin also gets routinely buried with Andersson. And got routinely buried with Stone. The only partners Hanifin has not been buried with were Hamonic and Brodie.
Yes, Hanifin plays second pair, but it's pretty clear his pair is driven by his partner. Let's not insunate Hanifin playing on a second pair means he is driving a second pair.