netwolf wrote:Paul Baxter wrote:Well, I'm glad to hear that you do like physical hockey, Netwolf. I based my comments purely on your past posts on this board, which have clearly indicated that you have no use for players like Carins and Ruutu. I specifically remember a post you made after Shero signed Ruutu in which you blasted the signing, because Ruutu was "too dirty" or something to that effect. We all have our opinions, but Shero must have thought that the Pens were too soft of a team and, therefore, felt guys like Ruutu, Petrovicky, and Thornburn were needed to upgrade team toughness. Needless to say, I strongly agree with Shero's moves. He knew darn well that the Pens were too soft. As for Cairns, yes, it's true he is not a good player, but he "can" play as a fill-in (he played regular NHL shifts in past years with the Rangers and Islanders), he's at least as good as Scuderi, IMHO. Most importantly, though, he is a genuinely feared fighter, which gives him a lot of value to this Penguins team.
I didn't like the Ruutu signing at the time because everything I knew about him suggested he was borderline dirty. I have no use for cheapshot artists. You can have a guy that plays physical without playing dirty. So far, he's been clean, so I've got no problem with him.
I don't think Cairns can take a shift without being a liability, either because he's a below-average player or because he'll take a bad penalty. When he played regular shifts for those teams, the league was a lot different. He's too slow, both with regards to his skating and how he reads plays and reacts. Reports from his conditioning stint said he was slow. That could have been rust, but if he's slow at the AHL level, he might end up in reverse at the NHL level.
agreed, when he was playing 25 minutes a night for the islanders, he and aucoin were effective because they were allowed to interfere constantly with the top lines. i have a feeling if he starts playing again, the only thing that will happen is a lot of penalty kills. the league is shifting toward guys like colby armstrong's energy/skill/fighter types instead of the defensive hooking guy that has the size to pummel the crap out of some uppity euro winger and mercifully so IMO.
I mean, Ruutu had to really stick it out to get to the guy to deliver it. Didn't bother me, though it would have if SJ hadn't lost their poise because this all happened with the puck in SJ's zone.
