Who is Dominik Kubalik

Team: 2020-21 Chicago Blackhawks

Initial Creation Date: Aug. 2, 2020

Published: Aug. 2, 2020

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

There's a lot of recent posts about Dominik Kubalik and well.....there's been ALOT of adjustments within the last 24 - 72 hours. Probably (correction...certainly...) prisoner of the moment thoughts because he did play really well in the exhibition game against STL (2 goals and 1 assist) and EDM (2 goals and 3 assists) Neither of their opponents played particularly well AND that is NOT at all the same Kubalik Hawks fans have been watching all season long.

Kubalik, in his last 2 games has 4 PP goals. He also had 4 PP goals ALL SEASON LONG. Kubalik's 30 goals are not at all because he's a PP force. I've recently see comparisons to Victor Olofsson who has 11 of his 20 goals from the PP. This isn't a good comp.

Before that I saw comparisons to William Nylander. I don't think this is a good comp either. Nylander is a faster playmaking winger who's defensive motto is the best defense is a good offense. That can indeed work sometimes, but that's not who Kubalik is. Kubalik isn't a 1-way player. Kubalik's hit more people in this shortened season than William Nylander has....in his entire 5 year career.

So who is he? Well let's talk about a few concerns... His 19.1% shooting percentage most certainly can not be sustained. Not possible. AND other teams are going to start to game plan for him. He's going to start to see shutdown lines against him. It's hard to truly understand how severe of an impact this will be. Only time will tell.

Not let's consider his untapped potential. The PP is truly an untapped potential for him. As mentioned earlier. He didn't get a ton of PP time this past season...AND when he did it started out as 2nd PP role. That's definitely going to change.

ALSO, the most important thing people need to understand is that he started the season with 8-10 ATOI. I have zero issue with this. He wasn't GIVEN anything. He earned 17-18 ATOI at the end of the season and his point totals went from 16 points in his 1st 35 games....to 35 points in his last 34 games. That's a night and day change.

Where do we go from here? BOTH Kubalik and the Hawks will want a 2-3 year deal. The reason BOTH parties want this is because he'll make good money today in hopes for a big payday down the road. Hawks need the term because the cap environment we live in today. I think 3 years $5M at this point. Kubalik will be 27 just like Panarin was. My player comp would likely be Patches. They're both 6'2". Both play LW. Both are 2-way players. Kubalik will need to continue his development in order to achieve the comp because teams will certainly start to game plan for him, but it's a real possibility and maybe...just maybe even better goal scorer. Only time will tell.