Fogghorn wrote:
Didn't want it to end yet, another year please. The Nucks will almost certainly ice 5 rookies. They could have benefited from the Sedin's. But mostly I don't want to see them go. Like ever.
Yeah, I don't think we'll ever see players like them ever again in the NHL, or any other sport for that matter. I was kinda hoping Milan Hejduk's boys would be the next Sedins, but one of them opted to become a defenseman.
The two of them are so very unique. They didn't hit their (collective) prime until around age 25, most NHL stars hit the ground running and peak around 20-24. I remember Gillis at his introductory press conference openly questioning whether they were players he could build around (obviously he chose to do so and succeeded better than anyone else by a wide margin). Their game wasn't built on speed at all, yet they never really looked out of place in an ever-quicker NHL, though they obviously hit a decline the last 2-3 seasons.
I think if they had been blessed with even halfway-competent management the team probably could've done a quick rebuild/retooling and been competitive again inside of 2-3 years. But the disastrous decision to go with John Tortorella more or less destroyed any chance they had of doing that, Benning and Linden just added salt to the wound.
Anyhow, I remember bashing them on a regular basis back in the West Coast Express days, I can say well over a decade later that I have eaten my fair share of crow, and happily so. They were fun to watch, even when they were frustrating the hell out of the Avs.