Quote:
Originally Posted by blankall
1) Ballard and Tanev only played together for 4 games last year. How can you possibly conclude that Tanev makes Ballard much better?
2) Tanev is a good puck mover? Explains the whole 2 points he racked up.
3) Of course Tanev is cheap. He's on an ELC. That only lasts for one more year though.
4) Already a 5-6 d-man? You do realize that is a bottom pairing d-man. He was also unable to crack the lineup until Ballard went down. That means he was unable to beat out Rome/Alberts for the 6-7 spot.
The fact of the matter is Tanev looked very promissing in the 2011 playoffs, but then took a huge step back last year.
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Ballard and Tanev played together for more than 4 games. Don't know where you're getting those stats. Heck they played 4 games together in the playoffs alone. Not a coincidence that it was the best consecutive 4 game streak of Ballard's time in the green and blue.
Tanev is only a puck mover in the sense that he is very adept in moving the puck out of his own zone with a smart, strong first pass. He's never been known to foray into the offensive zone.
He's obviously still going to be cheap after his ELC. I think we'd all be shocked if he started pulling in 3-4 million on his second contract.
He was always capable of beating out Alberts and Rome for ice time. Canucks management is on record saying that they wanted to leave him in the AHL for as long as possible to continue developing with top pairing minutes. Before he was called up, his AHL coach Craig MacTavish said he thought Tanev was the best defenseman in the league at that point. It's not that he wasn't ready or capable.