Quote:
Originally Posted by Flames Draft Watcher
It's about developing your kids into the best players they can be.
Pretty solid argument to be made that Gillies in particular will develop best and improve the most by starting a lot of games vs backing up a lot of games. No need to rush players at the most critical position in hockey. Gillies missed a whole year due to injury and the best thing for his development is playing a lot of games.
I really don't understand why anyone would want one of our top prospects to sit on the bench and stagnate vs develop by starting a lot of games. Goalies need to see pucks to improve. Gillies isn't going to learn to be an NHL starter by not playing games.
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There's also an argument that Gillies isn't going to learn to be an NHL starter either by playing AHL games.
Jankowski isn't going to learn to be an NHL player by playing more AHL games. In fact, I would argue that the 8 minutes that he would get on the 4th line, as well as practicing with NHL players day in day out would be the best for his development. We've also seen that our fourth line sometimes have to play against McDavid and Draisaitl - playing at that speed and level is something you'll never see in the AHL regardless of how many minutes you get to play.
Ditto with Gillies, facing NHL-level shots in practice every single day, then getting 25-30 NHL games is far better for development than being an AHL starter.
I think the main difference in our philosophies is that I don't believe quantity of playing time matters - I think that 8 minutes in the NHL is a higher quality opportunity than 20 minutes in the AHL, and does not lead to stagnation.