Would Hejduk in his prime have been a better player for Stas, Dutch or ROR?
He helps all considerably now as things stand because of his defensive ability but man, when he was younger, quicker and faster on the shot was he a weapon for both Sakic and Forsberg. I think that is what is killing this team...we don't have a Hejduk in his prime. Nothing against him mind you...but we don't have a clear cut sniper anymore....and I think at least two of our three young centers need one in order to become elite centers. We need a Svatos type bargain player put in the top six to give some scoring muscle to our centers. I hear that Meuller is close...but close after two/three years away from the game is about worthless. His legs, speed, shot and heart all have to be in question at this point. I have no idea what kinda fire burns in his belly. If he is going to be looked at as a top six forward, that fire better be stoked white hot and raging.
Hard to say. I gained a lot of admiration for him when he changed his game to suit his linemates after Forsberg and Tanguay were gone. He did a lot more to create offense when before all he really had to do was cycle the puck and finish when needed. Not that he only did that in the AMP line days, but in the latter half of his career he did a lot more lunch pail kind of stuff.
I guess my vote would be Duchene, but I think Hejduk's "prime" is kind of a relative thing. Sure, he wasn't a pure goal scorer in his later years, but did a ton of other things that didn't necessarily show up on the scoreboard.
Ray Bourque remains my favorite player in hockey period, but the Duke will probably go down as my favorite Avs player of all time.
I voted for ROR, but honestly I don't think any of these centers draw the attention to fully utilize Hejduk's skills.
I really agree with you on that last bit. I would say Duchene as he is so good and unpredictable on the rush but after watching IBS's video again all I can think is how incredibly gifted Peter Forsberg was...he was so good on the wrap-arounds but had this incredible ability to convince folks he was going to wrap-around but still make a pass back behind him to a trailing winger (usually Hejduk) walking in off the wall to stick it in shortside after everyone moved off to cover Peter coming out the other side of the net. There were so many times they combined for this and the goalie would just stand their dumbstruck trying to figure out what had happened. In my opinion it was pure chemistry. The only other two players to have that kind of chemistry on the AVs were probably Turgeon and Svatos. They just new what the other team was thinking they were going to do and understood each other so well they could change it up after the goalie and/or d-men had committed and create goals/chances.
