Quote:
Originally Posted by Flash Walken
What?
No.
What?
'Without the physical play'. That's 75% of what Hathaway brings and it's obviously in short supply this year in Calgary.
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Okay, I disagree. Hathaway was a good energy player who was actually pretty fast (not Rieder fast, but able to get up and down pretty quickly). He was also a great penalty killer, and his absence on the pairing is one of the reasons Jankowski has struggled on the PK this year. Hathaway was also decent at cycling the puck, but no better than Rieder.
Yes, Hathaway delivered the big hit now and then, but it wasn't his sole effectiveness out there. There's a reason he was signed by another team to term and there's also reasons why he's had some success early in the year with Washington.
He was just out of our price range with the Tkachuk cap crunch. A casualty of the cap for sure, but one you have to be willing to replace with guys like Rieder on league minimum contracts. I'm totally okay with how everything worked out. Rieder is a solid replacement for what Hathaway brought.