Quote:
Originally Posted by Calgary4LIfe
It is going to be a tough roster to crack by the looks of it, barring injuries or trades between now and opening night.
By the definition above, it has to be either Ruzicka or Yelesin.
Ruzicka has always been very promising, but it is his lack of consistency that is the issue. He has to jump a number of forwards, however. Not match what those other players ahead of him bring, but exceed. It is always going to be a smart move organizationally to send down the players that aren't waiver eligible unless they are CLEARLY better and ready for the NHL.
Yelesin is the only other prospect that I can think of that has a shot at it (once again, using the definition of non-top 10 ranked). I thought he was NHL-ready in the games that he was in last year. That's a tiny sample size, but I thought he did admirably in the minutes that he got. If he wasn't NHL-ready, I thought he was pretty darn close. I think Mackey is higher on that list (but was top 10) too. That's also a lot of players that Yelesin has to jump over.
It is going to be tough for any player to be on that opening night roster. Treliving has signed a good amount of depth (and still might be more to come if Dreger's rumblings were timely and accurate). I don't see it this year, but a pleasant surprise is always welcome.
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Agree with this but what I find Interesting is ten years ago finding anyone past the top five that had a legit shot was a pipe dream. The goalies have hardly been touched and I am a huge wolf guy. Yeltsin, some of the Russian and last years guys have hardly been mentioned. Imagine if we hadn’t traded some of those picks.
