Quote:
Originally Posted by dobbles
I know you guys have this thing as a fan base about the 'always earned, never given' type b.s., but it needs to stop. This is about maximizing your assets and putting your players in a position to succeed. Even if Wolf has a terrible camp, you start him. Because years of success have shown you what he is and what he can bring. And quite frankly, if he isn't that guy at the NHL level, might as well figure that out sooner rather than later, right?
Again, we have to take this development philosophy out of sports and frame it in any other context. YOu have a sales guy that has set records every quarter in his territories. Even as they get bigger and more complex. The guys on your top level clients have been coming up short all year. Are you really going to keep the young guy back because "he hasn't earned it"??? He's done everything asked of him and crushed it. If you don't promote him, in any industry that has any sort of open employment, dude is gone. You've just lost your top earner to your competitor. Obviously that can't happen in this case, but you have indeed disincentivized him.
I just don't see how you can ever tell Wolf to put on an AHL jersey again. If I were him and got told that, I would say, "what for?" And that wouldn't make me weak minded or not loyal, it would make me someone that knows my value.
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I'm a firm believer that this organization's insistence on a player having to "prove it at the NHL level" without actually giving the player the opportunity to prove it at the NHL level has held back prospects in this org for a long time now.
At some point you need to play the player in the role they are best suited to at the NHL level and let them develop there.
I don't think for Wolf that means he needs to be a starter. But I do think for his development he needs to play at least 25 NHL games next season.