Shrapnel - 2/12/12

Mats Sundin was truly a great player and deserving of having his jersey retired in Toronto. He is one of a handful guys that have really changed how the NHL looks at European players, not just as marginal skill players, but as true team leaders. For a big man, he had unbelievably skilled hands and was there anyone better at roofing a backhand deke? His International career was also exceptional for team Sweden and he scored many big goals in international tournaments. If Toronto had surrounded him with a bit more talent, I truly believe that he would have won the Stanley Cup, just like he won the Worlds and the Olympics. I salute you Mr. Sundin and I can only hope that we ever have a player on the Jackets like you.

On the Carter front, it seems like Portzline is completely sure that he will be traded, but that Jeff is not the one asking to be moved – interesting… I just hope that we don’t give him up without getting a substantial return. Personally I would like to see him stay, but I guess you can’t have everything you want in life. Goalies and top defensemen don’t come cheap.

Interesting article on the Jackets goalie situation. The bloggers/readers of the cannon have mentioned countless times that the team is poor at developing talent. Talk is mostly about the players in the NHL. But this article points out, at least with goalies that the whole organization can’t develop goalies from top to bottom. As I think about it, I would then extrapolate that out to other position groups. If the team poorly develops goalies within each level, why would a team be able to develop other position groups. Therefore are all of the high round picks the jackets bad players or did the team do a poor job of developing them?

It also makes sense to me that if you need an emergency recall for a position, you could have some random veteran to bring up and not disrupt a developing players rhythm. If someone gets hurt, sign another one to a minor league contract and bring them up if need be. There have to be lots of goalies/players that have played for several years willing to play in the minors. The only reason to bring up a player the team wants to develop into a good NHLer is if they are on the cusp of making the transition to the next level up. Moore or Savard are probably fine to bring up, because they are almost NHL ready. Bringing York or Corbeil to the NHL is stupid.