big if he hasnt hit 20 in 4 years and that was 25 for full season.

My personal expectations for Vrana are quite low, however; if he were to resume his career arc without the substance abuse phase, he would be a top 10 goal scorer in the nhl. He is extremely efficient at scoring. It is not unreasonable to project 40+. My personal feelings are that there’s a big risk his substance abuse issue is not resolved, and even if it is, he will have to earn the ice time to score those goals, as the team is dense.




Vrana has no significant injury history that should concern future teams. For his size, to have played at the rate of games as he has during his career is excellent.



Likely. But I know people who have had substance abuse issues and made changes to eliminate them from their lives. I know people who have them and won’t change. Vrana will show us which he picks.

Nahhhh, ain't no way you just said he has no significant injury history. He's never played a full season, he was injury prone BEFORE he was traded to Detroit. Stop it. He's made of glass.

At 22 years old he skated 82 games. At 21 he skated 73.

With his physical makeup and playstyle, he literally couldn’t have done that as well as be injury prone.

He had one shoulder issue, which he made worse with substance abuse apparently.

If you want injury prone look at Scotty Perunovich. That sentence may have given the dude a bruise. His injury history starts before he was drafted. Or Nolan Patrick. Or Robby Fabbri.

Pavel Bure played similar to Vrana. He had way more injuries. Nobody refers to him as injury prone.

Anybody who has this archetype has a higher risk of injury: they’re small, use their speed to execute, and are targeted physically by the opposition nightly, as they should be. If they couldn’t protect themselves they wouldn’t make it through a full season. What should be a real concern is whether there will be any post season production. The answer there is much more concerning to me than his health. Seems like the type of guy who would be a liability in the playoffs: the guy who both sucks at defense and disappears from the scoresheet.

That being said, had he avoided substance abuse and trended as his career would typically go, he’d be in the echelon of Kaprisov and Kuzmenko, the lower chunk of the best wingers in the game. He would be above guys like Jordan Kyrou who he would compare very favorably to, but be below the extremely good like Pasta, Marner, Jason Robertson, etc.

Bure's entire career is labelled as destroyed by injuries! Vrana hasn't played a full season in 5 years, he's injury prone. He's only played more than half the games available in a season twice in that time span, neither in the last 3 years. No. He's injury-prone.

I don’t count missing a season and a half because alcohol abuse occurred instead of shoulder rehab. I understand why somebody would have a different opinion.

I don’t think of pavel bure as injury prone. I think of him as a small fast dude who plays pro hockey. That type of dude will get injured period. There’s a difference to me. One dude could be Eric lindros sized (see what I did there) and be injured more. These little dudes aren’t going to go on Ironman streaks ever (with the exception to me of the ones built like brick ****houses such as DeBrincat, Marty St. Louis). Injury prone is different. That means you cannot protect yourself. Eric lindros couldn’t protect himself.

Lindros' size wasn't responsible for his injuries, the fact he was trying to use dude to break the glass was. Bure is one of the premier examples when you think of careers destroyed by injury. Even if he wasn't, there's no comparison between Vrana and Bure. Vrana has played 101 games over the last three seasons. That is not a healthy player. You cannot argue against that at this point. 220 eligible games over that time frame and he's played less than half of them. Whether that's injuries, off-ice issues with addiction, or anything else, that hurts his value. No one is going to pay this kind of price for him.

Of course the 2020-21 season was only 56 games long of which he played 50 of them.

I don't think the issue with the Wings was the substance abuse; Vrana wouldn't have been the 1st player Yzerman brought into the fold after entering and exiting the program. I think it was him electing for shoulder surgery during training camp in 21-22 season and then entering player assistance a couple of games into 22-23 and finally stinking up the place in GR. That doesn't seem to be the mindset Stevie appreciates, thus why he basically paid St. Louis to take him.