I’d really love to make fun of Ryan Miller for skipping out on the shootout because of cramps, but at the same time, I woke up yesterday in insufferable pain from a leg cramp of my own. It took me ten minutes to convince myself to get out of bed and put weight on it and I can still feel it now.

I wouldn’t want to be in a shootout with one either. Tough-bro hockey culture aside, I get it.

Anyway, that’s my lone thought from last night. Below, we have a mailbag with some of your questions. Lets break it down!

It’s hard to call any player in particular a “lost cause”, especially at 22 years old; Martin St. Louis had two NHL points at the age of 23 and twenty at the age of 24, and ended up just short of a thousand. But your expectations for Jensen admittedly shouldn’t be where they were a few years ago. His per-game productivty is slowly inching up in the AHL, but is still just over a half point-per-game, which doesn’t project well to the NHL level. 

At this point, his best hope is that he ends up a late-season call up, gets sent down after, clears waivers, has a decent playoff with Utica, and does well enough to get some preferential attention in next year’s training camp. But at this point, he’s less “top prospect” and more “younger, low-cost asset in the organization”.

It’s possible that he survives with the Canucks until the rest of the year, though far from a guarantee. I’d imagine that Andrey Pedan would be the first player to be assigned back to Uitca once Luca Sbisa returns, and by the time Dan Hamhuis is back, the team might already be selling. Short of them wanting to shrink the lineup to six defenders, he could find a way to stick around, even if he’s not their ideal choice by that point.

One would expect that Boeser will be a secondary/depth piece on team USA, where as Team Canada will rely on Virtanen heavily. I’m going to take the same bet, with that considered, and say that Jake pots more goals. 

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