me too, but i see very little chance of him clearing waivers. There's just too much skill there. he has never gotten a fair shot on this team, and that is very unfortunate.
- BINGO!
A couple comments:
--I don't mean to defend what Corvo has done so far. I just think paired with a stay-home defenseman he can be a serviceable 3rd pairing guy. You just don't get perfect sound defensemen who are power play capable in this slot because there are not enough to go around and fill NHL rosters.
--On Bowman. He was solid last season and made strides to becoming a decent 3rd line forward. If you project his stats last year he was on target for just under 15 goals and 30 points IMPORTANTLY while becoming a sound defensive forward. Remember these totals were playing with Brandon Sutter who logged a lot of minutes against the other team's best and also with about zero power play time. Something like 15-35 for this role is about right.
So fast forward to this year...I think the defensively capable tag is still about right. He needs to bring a bit more offense.
--On Boychuk. I just don't get the love for him. I think the key point of difference between me and others is this. The optimists view him based on what he can do in Charlotte against AHL talent and what he in theory could do at the NHL level if he could transfer his game. But he has not been able to do this. He gets knocked off the puck regularly having never shown any ability to use quickness, craftiness or a mix to compensate for his lack of size. He just always looks like a guy who can do all kinds of cool stuff in warmups or against lesser talent but just gets shut down mostly when he tries the same stuff against real NHL players who are a little bigger, a little faster, a little smarter than AHL equivalents. Maybe he gets claimed and proves me wrong elsewhere, but I just don't see it.
As much as people like to talk about Boychuk being so much better than Bowman offensively, in the same # of games (73 vs. 74) Boychuk has exactly 2 more points that Bowman. Key difference is that I think Bowman fits in a 3rd or 4th line slot where you can live with this but Boychuk really doesn't.
