Joined: Apr. 2020
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Quick disclaimer, this is going to be a rather lengthy post. I wanted to dive into Jack Hughes a little bit here and give some of my thoughts.
Jack Hughes is an interesting player, the things he's good at he seems to do exceptionally well (skating, playmaking, transition play, etc.) but the things he's not so good at he is essentially terrible (face-offs, shooting, puck protection, physical play). I know he's still young but I am growing slightly concerned with his style of play.
He is predominantly a puck distributer and that's fine, but I'm noticing a lot of instances recently where he's going out of his way to make a pass because that's what he's comfortable doing. Even if he has a decent play at the net or if he has a lane to skate with it, he'll do everything in his power to dish it off to someone else. He has no assertiveness whatsoever. He's always kind of been like this but it's been much worse since the Devils came back from their brief COVID pause. Even in his rookie season there would be times where he would skate through 3 or 4 defenders all the way to the net for a chance, we haven't seen anything of that nature this season. I feel like a lot of the time he's on the ice is spent just gliding around and making the odd pretty pass. His shot is weak, he rarely creates chances for himself, clearly he will never be a great goal scorer, he's dreadful in the face-off circle, gets pushed off pucks way too easily, the list goes on. Obviously the Devils have been terrible as a whole so you can't expect a 19 year old to be lighting the world on fire but for a guy that was the consensus #1 pick for years and supposedly the saviour of this team he is leaving a lot to be desired right now. I'm fearful that his considerable weaknesses might hold him back from ever being the player we need him to be.
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