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Originally Posted by Perfect_Drug
Being a minority I feel differently about this.
Do you know what its like to be 18 and away from your support network, and then not warmly welcomed by your immediate social circle?
Thankfully MPS had Omark to guide him a bit. He might not have been a great professional mentor by any means, but he was someone he could talk with after the game. Talk girls, videogames, movies, etc.
Good leaders identify Things like slumps, transition periods, They talk to you about it, help you through it, and really make the adjustment easy.
Hall is great with the media, but I don't see him taking a lot of responsibility for helping his other team mates get better. Horcoff had the rookies over for dinner pretty regularly. Something you'd expect from a captain.
I can't see Hall being as welcoming just yet. Maybe in a couple of years. His game is solid, but he does't have his shizzle together.
Being isolated at that age could see that turning an otherwise bright young player like Yakupov into a personality like Zherdev..
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I don't think Yakupov is going to be a loner or isolated. It sounds like he was one of the more popular players in Sarnia. I'm just saying who's to say Yakupov is even going to want to hang out with Hall and the rest of the young Canadians? Maybe they will become friends but if they don't, I'm sure Yakupov will find a way to survive.
Zherdev didn't turn into a "Zherdev". He was high maintenance from day 1. That's his personality. Yakupov will make friends. He's an extrovert that isn't going to need to be baby sat by Hall.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Perfect_Drug
Czech's absolutely hate russians.
:/
Hoping Laddy and Ales aren't like that but historically there's a lot of bad blood.
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I really think you're over analyzing this. I highly doubt two adults are going to ignore a 19 year old just because he's a Russian. For the record, Smid and Grebeshkov were very tight...and Yakupov's stall is beside Hemsky and Smid so I don't think Krueger expects a problem either.