He's a power forward not a playmaking pivot. He drives to the net making power moves and creates offense using his size and strength. That is his value that is his strength. He needs to fill out to attain this which takes time.
Not to mention what you mentioned above is based on a very miniscule sample size. He has barely played 20 games in north america yet you know this for fact. 20 games of which his team was offensively anemic. 20 games of which he was transitioning from European hockey to North American hockey as a 19 year old. 20 games during a time where there was poor transitional play from the back end (***** in terms of breakouts) and no evidence of any system. You can't single out one player when the entire team was playing some of the worst pro hockey I have ever seen. .
So power forwards are given a break on hockey sense? Doens't compute for me. You can still be a physical forward that drives the net and still have some hockey sense.
Oh and he didn't play well in Sweden last year either.
People need a reason to knock him for his lack of production so far. They can't really bash his physical skill because he skates well, shoots well and has great size & hands. So, the default is "no hockey IQ".
Why would people not want to like one of our top picks? That doesn't make sense. People question his hockey IQ because they think his hockey IQ is questionable.
So power forwards are given a break on hockey sense? Doens't compute for me. You can still be a physical forward that drives the net and still have some hockey sense.
Oh and he didn't play well in Sweden last year either.
Not saying all power forwards don't have hockey sense, just saying they tend not to rely on sense. Usually a power move or parking in front of the net hoping to deflect or bury a rebound is their role.
All jokes aside I hope he gets back into the lineup quickly so his development can continue. If the lockout breaks I hope they keep him down in Binghamton to get up to speed before throwing him into what could be a very fast paced regular season in the NHL.
I'm not looking through the thread, and I see Zbad has some pretty bad stats.
Why? Can someone inform me please?
Constantly gets hurt/had lingering injuries and was rushed back. Lost of a year of development last season due to injuries and played on a terrible team. Basically he has not been on the ice long enough to gel with his teammates to start putting up numbers. Apparently when he does actually play consistently he looks good.
There's a monkey on his back, he's been bitten by a snake, and he's plagued by the injury bug.
Can I nominate this post for post of the year?
Please?
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Back on topic. If there's one weakness that Zib has improved massively on, it's faceoffs. I don't think I saw him lose a single faceoff last game. Even if he busts massively on the offensive side of his game the guy could still be a very useful shutdown center/faceoff specialist.
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No, I'm not a girl. Stop asking!
