Tampa Bay @ Toronto

[Bouché]

Connolly is a 19 year old playing in the NHL and people are acting like he's a bust already. He obviously has areas where he needs improvement but I have no reason to believe he won't be a productive player in this league. In the World Juniors he was fantastic and really showed what he was capable of. To fault him because he hasn't yet carried over that level of play to the NHL seems unfair, in my opinion. I actually thought Connolly was visibly more confident on the ice after the tournament (including up until this point) and his game has gotten noticeably better over the course of the season. He has been getting and creating more scoring chances and his compete level has gone up. His defensive and physical play could use improvement, but those are issues that most rookie forwards have when they're new to the league. Connolly will only get better and stronger and he'll continue to get help in the areas he needs to work on.

With all that said, I'm not opposed to trading him if the right deal comes along. We've got some impressive wingers getting closer and closer to becoming NHL-ready and that could make Connolly expendable. Regardless of where he ends up though, I think he'll be a good player in this league. Patience is key.

[Alex]

There are three ways to communicate: the words, the inflection of the voice, and the non-verbal (hand signals, etc.) Remember we're only getting one of those on these boards.

Mis-communication will happen. Just trying to keep some things in perspective.

[bassassin]

Connolly is young, I see glimpses regularly from him that make me think he's going to be a good if not more scorer in this league, plays he thinks of and sometimes makes just make me stop, they are things I haven't seen anyone bar Marty and Lecavalier (circa 06-08) make regularly on this team.

But on the otherhand they are only glimpses right now so I can see where those of you that don't like him are coming from, plus he isn't always invisible in our zone (in the worst of ways), IMO it all depends on his work ethic and determination (just like EHM )but as I don't know the player personally I can't make that call.

I think that given all reports on him that he IS hard working and determined that there is no reason he can't be a very good player in this league, the skill level is there for sure.

[Sotnos]

Originally Posted by Alex

In fairness, this board has a better on-topic ratio than many, many other places I've been.

There are reasons for that.

Originally Posted by Avery86

There are dissenting opinions all the time, actually -- I read them almost every day here. The difference being, unlike Smitty's vitriolic post, they're presented in a non-hostile way.

Yep. As I believe I pointed out, stuff like that (and responding to every post after it with sarcasm) is BEGGING for trolling.

Originally Posted by timothy

Dude. You are new here. Lots of folks have been here a long time, and before that an eternity on the Sunsports board that died off while you were probably in elementary school. Point is there's a lot of history between posters that you have no clue about. There's a community that have been talking and discussing things for a long time and know each others tendencies. Your welcome to post here and we are glad you are here and want to contribute, but it's just plain goofy as a newbie to walk in and act like you are some arbiter of how folks should talk to each other.

This goes for everyone, frankly.

Closing this while I contemplate...