Em Blog Frozen

O general gerente George nos tampões midseason' McPhee foi no CapsReport e disse o microfone Vogel que Perreault tinha recebido “a contagem possível a mais elevada” no sentido do hockey de um jogador. He finished the 2006-07 season with 41 goals and 78 assists in 67 games, and he capped it off by winning the league’s MVP award.

He arrived in Washington for the first time this week (”It’s hot here” he complained to me), and from the opening moments of Wednesday’s opening scrimmage he displayed an elite game of deft playmaking, unrivaled puck control, and superb instincts. He scored two goals that night, and he sent flat accurate passes to teammates in every scoring sector.

Along the boards, where you might think him most vulnerable and overmatched, he actually excels, drawing defenders to him to create open space for his linemates. He wins most of his draws, many quite cleanly. He is in constant motion in the offensive zone.

But outlandish offensive numbers and hardware almost as tall as he is bear no relationship to Perreault’s shy and soft-spoken demeanor off the ice. He was frank in acknowledging how even he had no idea he was in store for an MVP quality CHL season.

He told me that last season was so spectacular that he is at pains to identify specific goals to better this season. Instead, he will focus on “improving my strength, [gaining] more speed . . . more speed.”

From McPhee’s midseason assessment to this week’s dynamic display I made a point of trying to press the GM for a bold forecast for Perreault. I didn’t want to know if McPhee thought Perreault simply NHL-destined but rather if once there he’d be an impact player.

“He’s a good player,” McPhee told me after Friday’s scrimmage. But what about an impact NHLer? “I wouldn’t be surprised at all,” he added.

NHL hockey will always have places for the undersized and overskilled and determined. Martin St. Louis or Steve Sullivan or Daniel Briere would score goals in any era. It’s too early yet to tell if Perreault’s on that kind of development arc, but he possesses in abundance hockey’s most coveted quality â€â€� game-dictating instincts and skills.