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Juuuust didn't quite make it

Frank E

Active member
Busta's #marliescrushmonday post, and certainly herman's unhealthy, and weird, obsession with Griffith got me thinking about your favourite Marlies/prospects that just couldn't cut it in the NHL no matter how much you wanted it for them.  Some of mine:

Williams
Newbury
Peelash
 
My first ever favorite player when I was a kid and used to see the Newmarket Saints (the Leafs farm team before St. John's) was Peter Ing.

He never really got a fair shake, though. :P
 
This may not quite be playing by the rules of the game because he did end up having something of an NHL career but Jay Harrison was always that guy for me.

Also Christian Hanson. I really thought he'd establish himself as at least a 4th line C.
 
I had Jay Harrison on my list, but figured because he's had a somewhat decent career he didn't count. But "guys that turned out OK but were discarded by the Leafs" could be another list.
 
Carter Ashton. Thought he'd be able to become a full-time NHLer somewhere. Still don't think Carlyle used him properly, and that messed him up.

Also really thought Matt Finn would have cracked an NHL lineup by now.
 
To redeem myself from my Harrison pick a teammate of his, Staffan Kronwall, was a guy I really thought would be able to play in the bigs.

And then from the "sort of had a NHL career post-Leafs" file is Nathan Dempsey.
 
My serious pick would be Dmitry Vorobiev. I really thought that he was going to be a solid top-4 defenceman for us if we could only get him to come over from Russia. Then it seemed like he never really took his career seriously as there were reports of him getting massively overweight. He's still playing in the KHL right now but his numbers suggest that he's nothing special.
 
Bullfrog said:
I had Jay Harrison on my list, but figured because he's had a somewhat decent career he didn't count. But "guys that turned out OK but were discarded by the Leafs" could be another list.
Harrison can thank Paul Maurice for rescuing him from the AHL. Paul coached the Marlies and when he was head coach of CAR he acquired Harrison. I liked Harrison too.
 
disco said:
Lonny Bohonos
Remember watching him in the Spangler cup years after his Leaf days. I shouldn't say watching... noticing via highlights that Bohonos was in the Spangler cup.
 
bustaheims said:
Carter Ashton. Thought he'd be able to become a full-time NHLer somewhere. Still don't think Carlyle used him properly, and that messed him up.

Also really thought Matt Finn would have cracked an NHL lineup by now.
Wasn't a big Ashton fan he would try to fight and always ended up bleeding profusely. A very punch-able nose apparently.

Matt Finn doesn't even ring a bell.
 
Pogge hurts the most because he was chosen over Rask... which triggered the dark days of Andrew Raycroft which lead to a death spiral for the whole franchise.

Pilar! Loved that guy. Heart problems and a lockout season steered him overseas where he stayed.
 
cabber24 said:
Bullfrog said:
I had Jay Harrison on my list, but figured because he's had a somewhat decent career he didn't count. But "guys that turned out OK but were discarded by the Leafs" could be another list.
Harrison can thank Paul Maurice for rescuing him from the AHL. Paul coached the Marlies and when he was head coach of CAR he acquired Harrison. I liked Harrison too.

Slightly off-topic, but I remember watching Stralman on the Marlies and thinking "holy crap, this guy is going to be really good." He got the call-up and played two half seasons with the Leafs then they traded him.........for Wayne Primeau.  :-\  The other guy they let get away (through waivers!) was Steve Sullivan. That really annoyed the hell out of me.

I also really thought Alyn McCauley was going to turn into a solid 2nd line centre, but that didn't pan out.
 
Bullfrog said:
cabber24 said:
Bullfrog said:
I had Jay Harrison on my list, but figured because he's had a somewhat decent career he didn't count. But "guys that turned out OK but were discarded by the Leafs" could be another list.
Harrison can thank Paul Maurice for rescuing him from the AHL. Paul coached the Marlies and when he was head coach of CAR he acquired Harrison. I liked Harrison too.

Slightly off-topic, but I remember watching Stralman on the Marlies and thinking "holy crap, this guy is going to be really good." He got the call-up and played two half seasons with the Leafs then they traded him.........for Wayne Primeau.  :-\  The other guy they let get away (through waivers!) was Steve Sullivan. That really annoyed the hell out of me.

I also really thought Alyn MacCauley was going to turn into a solid 2nd line centre, but that didn't pan out.

McCauley played 488 NHL games, so I'd say that's a pretty decent NHL career.
 
Pierre Hedin was someone who came over to North America with quite a bit of hype but fizzled out quickly. Wasn't he the guy one of his Swedish coaches called Lidstrom-like (I couldn't find any evidence of that from google but I thought it was about him).

edit: Looks like that Lidstrom comment I remembered was about Stralman, man we really should have listened to that.
 
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