One of the reasons why the Hurricanes acquired Jordan Staal this summer is because he is the type of player who can make the rest of your roster better. We've been over this hundreds of times before, but J. Staal's ability to drive the play and create offense despite playing the toughest minutes on the team allows Kirk Muller to free up some of his other lines to easier minutes. We've seen Muller utilize this strategy by giving Jordan Staal's line the majority of tough minutes while Eric Staal's line has gotten easier zone starts against secondary competition and the third line of Jussi Jokinen, Chad LaRose and Drayson Bowman have gotten some of the "easiest" assignments on the team.
In theory, this strategy makes a lot of sense because the Staal brothers are good enough to handle the toughs and Jokinen was able to efficiently move the puck forward last year in a similar, protected role. So far, one side of this plan has worked out well as Eric Staa...
Original Story:
|
January 31, 2013
