That Dude Scouting Report

[Cornholio 182]

THAT DUDE SCOUTING REPORT

 

S75 - Saskatoon

Regular Season - 8 G, 1 AST, 1 PT, -4, 11 PIM, 4 HITS, 1 SB

 

Postseason - 7 G, 1 Goal, 1 AST, 2 PTs, +3, 8 PIM, 5 HITS

 

That Dude joined the Saskatoon Wild as a post-trade deadline free agent, which was extremely late in the regular season. There wasn't much time to acclimate That Dude into the Wild's system but you can tell that he slowly got better as time and game minutes progressed. Comparing his regular/postseason with nearly identical amount of games - That Dude played better in the postseason when the spotlight shined the most and the pressure ramped up. In a tough, bitter 7-game series against the Las Vegas Aces, That Dude held up the Wild' third line and posted a plus/minus rating of +3 -- which is a good sign of his impact while skating on the ice. With a full offseason of training where That Dude has been skating and hitting the weight room like crazy -- the potential is there for That Dude to break out as an impact player in S76 for whichever VHLM team drafts him. 

 

In order to help VHLM GMs assess what they could get when drafting That Dude - here are two pros and cons. 

 

PROS

Faceoffs - That Dude loves faceoffs. As a 50-year old center, he embraces faceoffs and is readily willing to take on anybody. If he wins the faceoff, he's gonna play a lot better on the current possession. If he loses -- his mind is liable to wander off to ponder how he can win the next one. But that doesn't happen too often as That Dude's reaction time and hand-eye coordination from the second the referee drops the puck is uncanny. Overtime - you want That Dude taking all of the faceoffs, he's going to get you the puck first. 

 

Skating - That Dude is an extremely talented skater who can skate forward, backwards, sideways and even on his gloves if needed. I'm not sure how the latter is relevant to success in the VHL(M) but yeah, That Dude just wanted to point that one out. He's a speedster too, so if he breaks away - nobody is catching him. If somebody else's breaking away - Dude is gonna catch up. You really cannot teach skating at this level - either you got it or you don't... and he got it. 

 

CONS

Discipline - That Dude doesn't really care if he gets sent to the penalty box. If he makes a mistake, he'll just go over to the box, do his time and then come back onto the rink. He is only focused on himself and how he can be in a position to make plays, either that or he's running replays through his mind on the previous faceoff and how he can win the next one. So if you're a team that hates penalties, That Dude may not be the best fit. 

 

Passing - This is an odd bit -- as a center, often the guy has to be extremely well-rounded and a good distributor for the shooting wings. But That Dude's a scoring center who likes to shoot the puck and not give it off to somebody else. That could be a potential red flag if That Dude doesn't work on it before the next level.