Barron Kruulenstien Junior Review

[LefLop 45]

 

Barron Kruulstien was lucky. He was one of the early hatchers in his bask, and was able to escape the grizzly fate of some of the slower members. From an early age, Barron was known to be an analytical mind, preferring patience and guile over the more rowdy kids that he was surrounded with. Barron showed an aptitude for slipping out of slippery situations, so when it came time for the youngers to pick up hobbies and stuff to grow into sports, Barron was suggested to go to hockey. Aptly, he took to the sport like a fish to water. 

 

 

Barron quickly showed a couple of things early on his hockey career. He did not like hits, he did not like being sent to the penalty box, and he was not interested in scoring. Barron preferred to lurk and settle in the back, and loved being defensive and passing the puck. His entire demeanor of slow, steady, and for lack of a better word, boring play, was something that coaches eventually noticed, as Barron was not one to talk or do much to stand out from the crowd. Although it was evident that Barron was skilled, he did not seem interested in developing his game to be the type of brash, visible, flashy guy that a lot of his peers were or even relished being. Rather, the young man simply enjoyed refining the basics and relished in chances to quickly disrupt and impact plays before moving on, often leaving the flashier stuff to his teammates. 

 

Barron was eventually persuaded to try out for higher levels of hockey. There, once again, he was shown as mostly a boring player, one who could do the job and hold his own, but there was no thoughts of superstardom or anything with Barron. The most interesting attribute to him most likely was that whatever defensive task or assignment he was handed, he simply played up to the level of competition, and then moved on. Some started to suspect that he had more talent than he lead on, but was completely disinterested in showcasing it. The coaches then simply decided that they would increase the difficulty of assignments to Barron, and as it turned out, he was able to handle it. At this point, the coaches realized that they had perhaps a more special player on their hands than they thought. Frustratingly, it looked as though Barron had no interest in developing things like shooting, and would be more of a one way defensemen. 

 

After much prompting by his coaches, Barron decided to train himself a bit more and accepted a challenge to declare for the VHL. The coaches felt as though a change to a higher level of competition with different coaches may yet awaken a new desire from the otherwise stoic boy. Only time will tell if this is the case. One thing is for sure though - Barron remains as reclusive as ever before, only really interested in studying the game, mostly from a mental aspect.