Quote:
Originally Posted by dammage79
Building around Gaudreau and a new contract solves none the Flames problems IMO.
People have mentioned it before but Gaudreau is a Kessel. Not a bad thing but definitely not the guy to build around.
I just don't see a successful team build with Gaudreau as the centerpiece. His offense is great but it doesn't balance out the net negatives to the rest of the game. Especially when he is a choose his own adventure type in Flames zone.
Its a 5 man unit and they play as a 4 man unit 75 percent of the time Johnnys on the ice. And when he is in good defensive positioning, most of the time its half hearted efforts and he knows he cannot physically compete for pucks so he flutters off.
I guess what i am saying is, his overall game is so incomplete that his mates on the ice have to compensate for it and when he is breaking solo into the offensive zone theyre still trying to catch up and recover from essentially double duty defensively.
Trade him, build another way.
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But who is saying that Gaudreau has to be the centerpiece?
LWs are rarely the centerpiece of the team, no matter how good they are.
8.5 mill is not nothing, but it's also not so much that the player has to be the centerpiece. The cap would only remain flat 1 year into the deal. So percentagewise, it might not be much more than he makes now.
The problem isn't keeping/paying Gaudreau. It's getting someone who, like you said, is a centerpiece. Eichel, Wright, Bedard, etc.
That's easier said than done. But Gaudreau doesn't necessarily have to get in the way of that. If anything, Gaudreau would probably explode offensively if he were playing with an elite center who is a "centerpiece"