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Canucks fans must be patient with Vasili Podkolzin, who's starting to score |
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In my last blog, I promised that I'd check in on some of the Vancouver Canucks' prospects outside of Utica while we have a break from game action this week.
Nice of Vasili Podkolzin to step up and start scoring at the perfect time!
Last week, Craig Custance's guest on his Full 60 podcast was Gillian Klemmerer, self-described 'global hockey reporter' who does a lot of coverage of the KHL.
The podcast is available to everyone through Apple and Spotify. If you're a subscriber to The Athletic, you can listen to an ad-free version if you access it from within the app — which is worth the few extra clicks to get there, in my opinion.
I was casually aware of Gillian's work from Twitter, but was very impressed to hear her talk about the journey that led her to covering the KHL and how she goes about her work. From my experience at World Championships, I know it's no easy feat to get access in the world of Russian hockey.
I bring this up because, even though Gillian doesn't discuss Podkolzin specifically on the podcast, she does talk about Alexander Romanov, the CSKA Moscow defenseman who was drafted in the second round by Montreal in 2018 and who has been named to the World Juniors all-star team in both of the last two years.
Kemmerer confirms the idea that young Russian players who decline to sign extensions with their KHL clubs get the short end of the stick, in terms of ice time — partly as a form of punishment, but also because the clubs don't see the point of investing time and energy in developing players who are just going to leave for greener pastures in North America. Ice time is a carrot that they can use to try to prevent all their best young talent from fleeing for the NHL as soon as they can.
She says that's what's happened to Romanov. Yes, he's a defenseman, but it's pretty startling to see that the player we've seen generate so much offense at World Juniors has barely gotten on the scoresheet in the KHL. In 2019, he had eight points in seven games at World Juniors — compared to 1-3-4 in 43 KHL games. This year, he had six points in seven World Juniors games and is 0-4-4 in 33 games in the KHL.
Romanov was barely eligible for this year's tournament. Players have to still be teenagers as of December 31 of the tournament year — Romanov turned 20 on January 6, one day after the gold-medal game in Ostrava.
Here's Marc Bergevin, talking about Romanov's situation and providing some insight into why KHL players don't get released from their contracts.
With a work environment like this, it's not hard to understand why Russian players are very reluctant to discuss their future plans to jump to the NHL. Bergevin's pretty frank that he expects Romanov to join the Canadiens organization after his KHL contract expires on April 30, and begin his North American development path.
This is pretty much the template for Podkolzin, who has one additional year on his deal with SKA St. Petersburg before he's free to come to North America in 2021 — and who also has been limited in terms of KHL ice time and opportunity this season. We heard that he turned down a contract extension with SKA just before the draft, which probably has a lot to do with why we're seeing him used the way he has been this season.
Podkolzin can still go back for a third run at World Juniors next year, to see if he can add a gold medal to the silver and bronze that he already has. He just turned 18 last June 24, two days after he was drafted by the Canucks, 10th overall.
He has had such a bullish physique from the first time we saw him as a 17-year-old at the 2018 Hlinka Gretzky Cup. It's hard to reconcile that with the idea that he's now still five months away from his 19th birthday — 21 months younger than 2018's top pick, Quinn Hughes.
I saw this on Twitter yesterday and thought it was a pretty astute observation:
In the case of Canucks fans, they're ecstatic about the upside of 24-year-old Brogan Rafferty, but already worried about Podkolzin. As a college free agent, Rafferty was certainly a nice find, but whether this recent scoring outburst turns out to be a blip or the start of something big, let's give the kid, Podkolzin, some time!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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