Save me your stories of
Redemption. I’m not buying what you’re selling. Come back when you aren’t peddling fantasies or blatant lies.
That’s my reaction to the post-Cup glut of stories about the great redemption of Phil Kessel and Justin Schultz. It’s garbage. It’s lazy. It’s insulting. Redemption for these two implies that they have proven to be something more than what we thought they were. Phil Kessel was run out of Toronto as a malcontent who didn’t take his game seriously enough to win on a regular basis. Justin Schultz was run out of Edmonton as a failed defender with no own-zone skills and limited offensive upside.
To write stories about their great redemption now that they are Stanley Cup Champions is a great injustice to the truth of the matter. The fact is that both of these stories are wrong, but for different reasons. I understand their draw. It’s a beautiful narrative. Everybody loves a good redemption story (well, almost). But if the stories aren’t grounded in truth then we sway into the realm of high fantasy. And if we’re doing that then I’d rather read your fan-fiction about Arya Stark than your fan-fiction about Phil Kessel.
Phil Kessel has redeemed absolutely nothing with his performance in the Stanley Cup playoffs and this season as a whole. He hasn’t redeemed anything because there was nothing to redeem. The only people who thought Phil Kessel had anything to prove were blathering fools without the ability to see a high-end hockey player despite watching him play and practice every day for years.
Phil Kessel needed no redemption! He spent 6 years with the Leafs between the 09-10 and 14-15 season. During that time, he was 16th in points in the entire league with 394 in 446 games. He was 5th (!) in goal-scoring over that same stretch with 181 regular season lamps lit. It would take an extremely high quantity of paste ingested to make someone with a lick of common sense to believe this player was A) a problem and B) in need of redemption.
Playoffs? Between his first 2 seasons with the Bruins and the lone entry into the playoffs his Leafs made, Kessel appeared in 22 playoff games before adding another 24 this year. During THAT time he picked up 21 points, including 13 goals. During this run he lead the Penguins in scoring with 22 points in those 24 games.
Redemption? Please. The only stories about Phil Kessel that should be coming out are long-form Mea Culpas ending in resignations from the hot-dog fabricating so-called journalists who couldn’t recognize the truth without an NHL executive leaking them the info or couldn’t spell "ethics" without an editor checking their work.
And Schultz? I wont try to pile on Schultz here but statements like this challenge my ability to keep a straight face.
In four months, Schultz has gone from boos and healthy scratches with the Western Conference's worst team to playing a key role in bringing the Cup back to Pittsburgh.
…
Schultz also made a great defensive play on the game's first good scoring chance. The Sharks' Matt Nieto stole the puck and had a breakaway down the left side. Penguins goalie Matt Murray stopped the shot, and Schultz went full-force in front of the crease to clear out a Sharks rebounder.
It's the kind of play the Oilers rarely saw but the Penguins have come to expect.
Read the whole thing
here if you really must, but let’s cover some of the bases right now. Justin Schultz did not play a key role in bringing the Cup back to Pittsburgh. Far from it. He played 7th defenseman minutes even after he was elevated to 6th defenseman status when the player the Penguins really wanted on the ice got injured.
He played 3 games in the first 2 rounds. 3 in an entire month of hockey. In that first round he played a grand total of 5 minutes and 52 seconds. Albeit, apparently, a very key not-quite 6 minutes. I guess. It’s absolutely true that once the series against the Lightning started, Schultz played more, but we’re still talking extremely sheltered minutes.
When the Cup was on the line and the Penguins were looking to close out the series against the Sharks, the tactic with Justin Schultz was clear: Keep him off the ice. The Penguins won game 6 in no small way because they opted to give him just a single shift after the Logan Couture goal where he lunged one-handed in a Jultz that typified the kind of play Oiler fans had come to expect.
As for what Oiler fans rarely saw but Penguins fans have come to expect, that can really only be used to describe the restraint the coaching staff used with Schultz’ ice-time. Full marks to the Pittsburgh coaching staff for finding a way to play Schultz the appropriate amount of time in a game. That’s something Edmonton never could figure out even when the answer was painfully obvious.
It’s a little too early to be talking about redemption for a player that helped his team win by sitting on the bench and staying out of the way. I’ll be open to Schultz’ redemption when he starts to earn regular ice time and isn’t leaking chances all over his own zone. It could happen, but I’m not holding my breath.
Phil Kessel and Justin Schultz are Stanley Cup Champions. They don’t need false tales of redemption. Schultz has a lot of miles to go before his tale of redemption is ever going to be completed and every ounce of digital ink wasted on Kessel’s redemption ought to be used for the apology going his way instead.
Keep the post-Cup stories of redemption for those who actually earned them or those who actually needed to be redeemed. I’m not interested in reading more fabricated lies, even if they sound nice.
Follow me on Twitter @Archaeologuy 
Edmonton Oilers Blogger • 
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