The Vancouver Canucks missing the playoffs is just a formality at this point. Last I checked, they had a 0.7% chance of making the show according to www.SportsClubStats.com. So yeah, hope is in short supply.

Or at least hope was in short supply. The Canucks signed 2014 third-round pick, Nikita Tryamkin, away from the KHL and hope to get him into some games before season’s end. Honestly, I’d be happy if the Canucks landed a fifth or sixth defenceman with this pick. Yet I keep hearing he’s the second coming of Zdeno Chara.

I wanted to get the writers at Canucks Army to chime in on the Nikita Tryamkin hype train. Let’s hear their thoughts.

Odds are slim to make the NHL for even the best of prospects, and Tryamkin hasn’t shown anything to suggest that he’s destined for a big role in the NHL. Realistically, reasonable expectations are that he doesn’t stick in the league. 

As Canucks fans, we have plenty of negativity in our lives already. Expecting a low scoring overage 3rd round pick to be the next Chara is destined for disappointment, so let’s just try to be happy with whatever we get.

Knowing the Canucks in their current state, they’re likely to have all the time in the world for a big, physical defenceman. Perhaps comparing him to Chara and giving him the Bure-esque hype to his first practices and his debut is a little out of line, but he would have to be pretty bad to not get every possible opportunity.
Fortunately, all signs point to him being serviceable. Tryamkin saw his minutes climb throughout the year with Avtomobilist and quickly became their go-to shutdown defenceman, which is unsual for a younger player, let alone one that everyone expects to leave the team. The results were there, too; while they didn’t stick in the playoffs for long, the team is relatively stretched thin for talent, to the fact that they squeaked in means that their key players deserve a wealth of praise.
If nothing else, it’s safe to assume that Tryamkin will be a third pair PK specialist moving forward, which is more than enough given his regular expectations. Whether he can match up to the current hype is anybody’s guess, but we’ll see how the process unfolds.

I’d like to give Nikita Tryamkin the benefit of the doubt, especially because he sounds both excited to head for North America and ambitious about how good he’s going to be. He’s big and wants to be ‘better than Chara’, which is always a nice thing to hear from a player who could easily become nothing more than an oversized pylon on the back end.

That being said, though, I’ve never seen him in North America – I’ve barely seen anything from him overseas. It’s so hard to tell how a player of his size will adjust to playing here, and we don’t have much knowledge yet of how much development time he’ll be willing to spend in the minors. Our best comparable is likely Viktor Svedberg in Chicago, and he’s been all right as a lower pairing guy. That’s kind of role with the ambition to be the next Chara isn’t the worst thing we could get – I’m just not expecting the next elite oversized defenseman. My expectations for Tryamkin are pretty much that he’ll be Svedberg 2.0, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.

He could be Chara but with the finesse of Bure I mean who’s to say?

Reasonable expectations should be that he needs time to adjust to the North American game. He’s been playing well in the KHL, but it’s a much different environment here, which I feel like he can thrive in with time. Reasonably, expect a guy that can be a compliment to the blue line, for now. And maybe he can become a top pairing guy in a few years, who really knows? But everyone breathe.

Even if the Canucks only get a 5-6 defenceman out of him – that is a good thing. Getting that value out of a 3rd round pick should be considered a win. To add to that, Canucks already have Virtanen and McCann from that draft, and Demko seems to be trending towards being an NHL player so anything Tryamkin does is a bonus.

Considering we have seen this guy practice ONCE, anything is possible. His hype train no doubt is runnin strong but he’s a Russian defenceman. He’s a top prospect as of now but his language barrier will hinder him a bit and im sure learning willie’s system can’t be too easy or fun.

He’s a Canuck and he actually made the big club quicker than others have so I’ll give him that. Maybe he is the next star who knows, as of now I’ll shoot for Edler potential which isn’t bad at all.

Can’t say too much on the topic. Have an article on the way shortly. Wouldn’t want to spoil it or anything.