Quote:
Originally Posted by ComixZone
It gets worse when you look at what other teams do with their top picks. Sam Reinhart struggled just like Bennett has, but Buffalo then stapled him to players better than him - and I think in no small part thanks that decision, Reinhart started hitting his stride and started producing more.
It's not Sam Bennett's fault that Treliving has royally screwed the pooch on building the bottom 6. Nor was it Sam Bennett's fault that Treliving signed Glen Gulutzan as the head coach. I'd argue, prior to Derek Ryan last year - Sam Bennett has been our best player in the bottom 6 since he arrived in that spot. That's not how you successfully develop young players - and it's not like we have a long history of amazing success developing players at the AHL or NHL level, so the blind faith in blaming the player and praising the team seems misguided to me.
I'm not saying Bennett would have been the 90 point player that we all envisioned on day 1, but the mixture of Glen Gulutzan being an absolutely horrific NHL head coach, and Treliving's inability to build a bottom 6 has hurt Sam's development significantly. He is what he is today - which is a 3rd line player who could still one day work his way up a roster, but it's best to just accept him as that 3rd line player who shows up for big games - and that's not a bad thing. Stop looking for faults in his game, because perfect players don't exist on 3rd lines. He has his ups and downs, but there are plenty of positives - just maybe not as many as we would have liked to start this season, but that same view exists across the entire roster, or at least it should - as it has not been a stellar start to the year.
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Pay much attention to the Flames bottom 6 last year? How has Treliving 'royally screwed the pooch' and who has consistently done a better job?
I would say the Flames bottom 6 today is better than it has been for at least a decade. If you're going to point to Treliving first 2-4 years and say how brutal they were, well it takes time to build your roster.
Be better man.