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Reilly To The Wing

azzurri63

Well-known member
This was talked about in years past but what does everyone think of moving Reilly to the wing. I think instead of signing Bertuzzi move Morgan and use the Bertuzzi or Domi money to sign another D man. Morgan's season and playoffs were a disappointment and I have never liked his defence. Thoughts?
 
azzurri63 said:
This was talked about in years past but what does everyone think of moving Reilly to the wing. I think instead of signing Bertuzzi move Morgan and use the Bertuzzi or Domi money to sign another D man. Morgan's season and playoffs were a disappointment and I have never liked his defence. Thoughts?

I think we're already short a couple of dmen. Moving Rielly to a wing would add to that deficit.
 
Everybody laughs at these ideas (and Kaberle really would have been the ideal guinea pig), but when you've bombed out 8 years in a row in the playoffs I don't think anything should be ruled out of tabletop scenario planning.

That said, Rielly doesn't strike me as a guy who could do that.
 
Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate said:
Everybody laughs at these ideas

Because it?s never happened. The only example I can think of that has happened over the last 50 years is Byfuglien, and even then he ended up going back to defence.

It?s just such a dumb discussion point because it just never, ever happens. No NHL player has gone 11 years into their career and then will just switch positions. I?m sorry to be harsh but this is just a stupid topic.
 
Joe said:
Because it?s never happened. The only example I can think of that has happened over the last 50 years is Byfuglien, and even then he ended up going back to defence.

It?s just such a dumb discussion point because it just never, ever happens. No NHL player has gone 11 years into their career and then will just switch positions. I?m sorry to be harsh but this is just a stupid topic.

Yeah. It's extremely rare that players can translate their game to a completely different position when they've been playing their position for most of their lives. They basically have to completely reprogram their entire way of processing the game to move from D to F. It's not like moving from C to W (and, the inverse of that is something lots of players struggle with, and it's a less of a change than D to F). There's been a handful of successful examples in the history of the league, and almost all of them are from pre-expansion. The league isn't exactly teeming with players like Red Kelly.

It's a silly idea that keeps coming up over and over again, because people only think about a player's skillset, but it's the mental side of the game that makes this a virtual impossibility over the long haul. Rielly's spent 20+ years of  his life processing the game from the blueline, making reads from the blueline, making decisions with the puck from the blueline, etc. You can argue all day long about how good he is or isn't at those things, but, the fact remains, that's how he thinks the game. It's extremely unlikely he's able to just flip a switch and suddenly completely shift perspective over the summer without it being a disaster (or close to). If the Leafs did try something like this, it would likely only last a handful of games before they abandoned the whole thing because it was clearly not working - never mind the fact that Rielly is the only D on the team who skates with the puck well. The Leafs need more mobility on the blueline, not less.
 
Joe said:
Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate said:
Everybody laughs at these ideas

Because it?s never happened. The only example I can think of that has happened over the last 50 years is Byfuglien, and even then he ended up going back to defence.

It?s just such a dumb discussion point because it just never, ever happens. No NHL player has gone 11 years into their career and then will just switch positions. I?m sorry to be harsh but this is just a stupid topic.

Brent Burns went from D to Forward back to D as well.

Edit: Looks like Burns went from forward, to D, back to forward, then back to D where he has stayed.
 
Dappleganger said:
Joe said:
Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate said:
Everybody laughs at these ideas

Because it?s never happened. The only example I can think of that has happened over the last 50 years is Byfuglien, and even then he ended up going back to defence.

It?s just such a dumb discussion point because it just never, ever happens. No NHL player has gone 11 years into their career and then will just switch positions. I?m sorry to be harsh but this is just a stupid topic.

Brent Burns went from D to Forward back to D as well.

Wasn't Burns a forward in junior?
 
Dappleganger said:
Joe said:
Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate said:
Everybody laughs at these ideas

Because it?s never happened. The only example I can think of that has happened over the last 50 years is Byfuglien, and even then he ended up going back to defence.

It?s just such a dumb discussion point because it just never, ever happens. No NHL player has gone 11 years into their career and then will just switch positions. I?m sorry to be harsh but this is just a stupid topic.

Brent Burns went from D to Forward back to D as well.

that didn?t happen a decade into his nhl career.
 
Even leaving aside how the odds of this happening are zero percent, we need to be adding higher end defencemen to the team not taking them away.
 
Joe said:
Dappleganger said:
Joe said:
Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate said:
Everybody laughs at these ideas

Because it?s never happened. The only example I can think of that has happened over the last 50 years is Byfuglien, and even then he ended up going back to defence.

It?s just such a dumb discussion point because it just never, ever happens. No NHL player has gone 11 years into their career and then will just switch positions. I?m sorry to be harsh but this is just a stupid topic.

Brent Burns went from D to Forward back to D as well.

that didn?t happen a decade into his nhl career.

Burns played RW for the Sharks in 2013-2014, 10 years into his career.

If you look at Burns' 'Average Time On Ice' you can kinda see which seasons he slotted in at forward and which he played D.  (Also his blocked shots)

Looks like he played first 3 seasons at forward. Next 5 at D. Next 2 as forward, and last 10 at D. 

https://www.hockey-reference.com/players/b/burnsbr01.html

I'd say Burns is the exception to the rule.
 
Dappleganger said:
Burns played RW for the Sharks in 2013-2014, 10 years into his career.

Except, as you point out in the rest of your post, that wasn't the first time he played as a forward in the NHL. He didn't suddenly make the change. He'd been used as both in the NHL prior to that (more on D, obviously, where he's better suited). From what I can tell, he's played around 200 NHL games at forward, the rest on D.  13/14 was the only time to played the full season up front (from what I can find online). He's basically a giant bearded unicorn.
 
bustaheims said:
Dappleganger said:
Burns played RW for the Sharks in 2013-2014, 10 years into his career.

Except, as you point out in the rest of your post, that wasn't the first time he played as a forward in the NHL. He didn't suddenly make the change. He'd been used as both in the NHL prior to that (more on D, obviously, where he's better suited). From what I can tell, he's played around 200 NHL games at forward, the rest on D.  13/14 was the only time to played the full season up front (from what I can find online). He's basically a giant bearded unicorn.

And he was a forward in Junior. He was also swapping from forward to D in season at least some of the time with Minnesota.

 
Dappleganger said:
bustaheims said:
Dappleganger said:
Burns played RW for the Sharks in 2013-2014, 10 years into his career.

Except, as you point out in the rest of your post, that wasn't the first time he played as a forward in the NHL. He didn't suddenly make the change. He'd been used as both in the NHL prior to that (more on D, obviously, where he's better suited). From what I can tell, he's played around 200 NHL games at forward, the rest on D.  13/14 was the only time to played the full season up front (from what I can find online). He's basically a giant bearded unicorn.

And he was a forward in Junior. He was also swapping from forward to D in season at least some of the time with Minnesota.

Yeah, which makes him a very different scenario than moving Rielly to forward suddenly, for the first time at any major junior or professional level.
 
My point, again, is that I don't think Rielly is a good candidate but I don't think it's a categorically stupid idea either.  If Marner can play a little D, then I don't think it's impossible *on the face of things* that someone as skilled as Rielly to switch to wing.

Anyway, this is just idle offseason talk, no harm in that.
 
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