why play JFK on the 4th line tho? He can get legit minutes on the first line in providence

Becuz ruin his offensive potential.... this message brought to you by Don Sweeney, who didn't fkin get rid of Spooner for Scandella so JFK has no home on the 3rd line now. The best part is that if Spooner wins his 3.85M dispute, we can't walk away from it. We have him at that number and we don't even want or need him. He's too soft to be a bruin, send him to Vancouver please. They like that type of stuff. Spooner + for any of Edler, Stecher, Tanev, Gudbranson or Hutton. They'd totally be infatuated with Spooners mild manner soft skill play and totally surrender a good dman for him. He could be the 3rd Sedin better than Louie Eriksson!

It's not the end of the world keeping Spoons for 1 year anyway. JFK isn't ready yet to take 3rd C role. Doesn't mean we still can't trade him during the year either....

I think you'll be pleasantly surprised with Heinen. He's a responsible hockey player with an offensive upside and is a great skater. Bjork is a little bit of a hot head, and may get schooled in camp. Prove it in Providence first.

I think Bjork has the leg up on Heinen right now. If only one were to make the roster it'd probably be Bjork. Heinen's put up no stats and he was invisible in all 8 NHL games I witnessed him playing in. I don't watch AHL games unless I go to them, but he didn't seem to be anything special in that league either. He's a middling type filler guy, who while he's a step up from the crap we think is signable.... Agostino, Czarnik, Schaller. he's not a real top line talent at all. Rumors have him on line 1. I literally can't comprehend how great of a camp he would need to have to achieve that. I can't visualize that yet because he's done minimal stuff for a high level prospect. I don't see how he's a better option than Bjork, and I'm like a total " we should all pump the brakes about Bjork". Type person.

"He was 21 this year and scored 0 points in 8 games in the NHL and then averaged about 2/3rds a point a game in the AHL. These numbers aren't impressive at all to me."

You realize in those 8 games as a pure rookie with ZERO pro experience he avg'd 13 minutes a night right? Its kind of tough to get in any kind of rythm with zero experience and barley 100 minutes of ice time. Not to mention he basically carried the Baby B's in scoring for the playoffs with just over a point per game....but I guess that isn't impressive either. JFK on the 4th line is a waste and he'd be better served in the AHL getting top line minutes and experience. Lastly Vatrano has shown nothing that warrants a top 6 spot. I'd rather have DeBrusk up there playing a PWF role than Vatrano, who will just take shots away from Pasta.

I llike DeBrusk too, but like Beleskey, I think we give Frankie and Bels one more shot to prove their worth, they're under contract anyway. Both Bels and Frankie have been suffering through injuries last 2 years so I'm not sure we've seen the best of them yet. If they don't produce out of the gate, then DeBrusk and/or maybe Bjork can be called up.

How are you saying 13 minutes a night is not enough? Spooner got 14 mins and he was a core special teams player. Vatrano got 13 minutes. The fact is Heinen got a very generous amount of ice time when he could have been offered single digit minutes lol. How you twist that into being not enough is funny and shows you know not what you talk about. 13 minutes a night for a rook on his level is extremely rare, it's almost always less, especially when he's not producing. They could have easily and honestly given him 9 minutes a night and it would have been considered fair.

I agree he was good in the playoffs, but there are plenty of guys who are good in the AHL and can't keep up mentally with the NHL game. He did basically nothing in the NHL and I honestly think Cehlarik was almost twice as good as Heinen. Cehlarik had a lot of nice passes that didn't actually lead to anything, but they were still great plays. Especially breaking out of the defensive zone, when he got the puck he almost always made a great pass to start some momentum heading up the ice. I'm not sure how hurt Cehlarik is, but I think he'd be ahead of Heinen on the depth chart.

It all depends on training camp. If Cehlarik is healthy, I'd go in this order of likelihood of making the team: Bjork, Cehlarik, Heinen, JFK, DeBrusk, Senyshyn, am i forgetting some people? I really don't think Heinen's proven anything yet. His resume is basically average for a rook trying to make the team. How that equates to being on the 1st line because he had a good AHL playoffs is funny. His fate is basically going to be 95% dictated by his performance in camp and our need to integrate youth into the lineup. If Cehlarik is healthy, I'd rather go with him. I'm not a huge Bjork fan yet, but I think he's the better fit on line 1 with the big dawgs. He played RW at ND, so he'd be a great option. Heinen could play at LW, but really camp is determining a lot of peoples fates this year.

I have it so far that the only players who are basically hammered in stone into the lineup is: Marchand Bergeron #1 line Krejci Pasta #2line Backes #3line Chara #1pair Krug #2/3pair Miller #2/3pair McQuaid #2/3pair Everyone else is in competition. I know you might be like "wtf?" that I have Carlo in competition, but I think if he dips a bit McAvoy could take his spot and move him down a pair. Spooner isn't a sure thing to stay. LW is total competition after Marchand. The D pairs could be jumbled. The 4th line could see changes. I think Nash could be a sure thing as #4 C, but what if Accari and Kuraly have been working really hard this offseason? Where does Czarnik and Schaller fit in as well as Agostino?

All of this stuff leads to a lot of players trying slightly harder because they know they have to do more just to carve out a spot. Anything can happen and a lot of guys are going to go up or down based on training camp. Don't underrate the change of coaches. Cassidy may see things differently than Julien did and this would be Cassidy's first real chance to make some big changes. Last year taking over, he kind of had to go with what Claude decided, until someone proved they weren't good enough like Spooner did. He wasn't going to step right in and flip players and scramble the lines because that would have been very foolish. Bruce Cassidy could be the X factor this year.