Should They Stay or Should They Go?

The Bucks fan who goes by aeb33 has posed to me a question about how I feel about his list of who should stay and go from this season's team.

In case you haven't seen that post on the CHL Forums, you can find it here or view the list below in its entirety.

Keep:
#39 Sebastien Centomo - Enough said, and now that goalies don't count as vets, we can keep him as long as he wants to be here.
#35 Andrew Martin - A hell of a pick up. Excellent goalie, if we keep these two goalies, we'll have a solid keeper night after night. Huge step up from Ryan Gibb.
#24 Steve Weidlich - Unbelievable defenseman, great skater, has been with the team for 7 years, he likely will not play anywhere else for the remainder of his career. Probably the hardest shot on the team. (Veteran)
#28 Adam Rivet - Another solid defenseman, makes very few mistakes. Can blast it from the point.
#20 Matt Miller - I love how this guy plays, very physical player, likes to dig deep in the corners.
#11 Jeff Bes - No explanation needed. (Veteran)
#10 Jason Dixon - Very fast skater, hits hard.
#7 Alex Goupil - Another fast skater, has hit a slump, but always a scoring threat. (Veteran)
#3 Igor Agarunov - Great two way player. (Veteran)
#19 Rick Kozak - Stop taking so many penalties, other than that, we need someone everyone is afraid of.

Maybe:
#4 Shawn Snider - Great speed, great shot. Not a very good puckhandler, if he doesn't get tossed out of the faceoff he usually loses it.
#18 Darryl Smith - Amazing talent, the only reason he's on the Maybe list is because he will likely move on to the ECHL or AHL.
#22 Brent Cullaton - Past his prime, sorry Cully. (Veteran)
#79 James Hiebert - Very good, but probably won't play again. (Veteran)
#17 Devin Featherstone - Really good defenseman, will probably move on.
#5 Jaye Judd - Didn't see him play enough. Can't put him in the other categories.
#44 Vincent Zaore - Solid, but again, didn't see him enough.
#29 Serge Dube - Would love to have him back, but he may be retiring. (Veteran)

There's the door:
#21 Bobby Russell - Huge flop, was supposed to complement Bes, instead he finished with only 36 points. (Veteran)
#13 Ryan Salvis - Fast, but never noticed him on the ice.
#6 Erick Lizon - We need an enforcer, but, at least Kozak put up 44 points, Lizon put up 16.

My take? This is going to take a while, but, let's start with the veterans. As each team can only have four veteran skaters, you need to decide which four you want around.

You are right to say that Bes is a yes with no explanation necessary. In addition to being a great player, he really cares about what he does here. I think he took the loss last night harder than most of the guys who were actually on the ice for it, and that tells you a lot.

Dube did care, too, but I really think he is set on retiring now. He first said he came back to try to bring home another Cup, but then noted that there would be too many vets after this season and he didn't plan to take up a spot next year.

Due to the fact that Cullaton didn't bring his wife and kid(s) out here even though his dad is here, too, I'm guessing he didn't expect this to be a permanent thing and he should possibly be scratched off the list of possible returners.

Russell, on the other hand, did move his wife and sons down, but obviously didn't have the season expected of him. I don't know if calling him a "huge flop" is fair, though, when you consider he barely got to play alongside the guy he was meant to compliment and missed a couple months with an injury.

He is a great guy and a good leader, but I'm not sure Ruskowski's system is one in which he can thrive. Thus, I would have to agree that he might not be one of the vets the team should want to keep around.

Weidlich has been here for every up and down this team has gone through, and I think it's obvious Ruskowski has always considered him a key part of the team whether observers have agreed or not.

He, like the other elder defensemen on this year's squad, had a bit of an off year, but Featherstone likely moving on, having a defensive defenseman stick around will be a necessity.

So that leaves two spots open with Agarunov, Goupil and Hiebert still unaddressed. Assuming Ruskowski doesn't want to bring in any new veteran guys, that leaves him with a tough decision.

Agarunov, as I have noted previously, is good on both sides of the puck and great at contributing to the offense when he's a defenseman and the defense when he's a forward. Plus, the guy is great on the penalty kill. And he has been here his whole pro career, giving him a bit of a bond with Ruskowski. So I'd agree with the yes on that one.

Now, as far as Goupil and Hiebert...oy. Such different players in so many ways. Hiebert is a great guy to have around in so many ways, but honestly, his attitude isn't the greatest. Plus, there are always going to be a few other things on his mind now that he's started his own business. However, the fans here love (or love to hate) him, and that's not something any coach wants to give up voluntarily.

I'd say what it might come down to is how cooperative Hiebert is during contract negotiations if both sides decide they want them. But if he doesn't work out, I see no reason why Ruskowski would want to give up a player with Goupil's attitude, work ethic and skill.

As far as everyone else...

Centomo has been much better than many people have given him credit for most of this season, and he played a lot of games with a nagging injury that he's only going to be able to take care of now that the season has ended.

Martin has also been impressive since getting here, and I honestly don't remember seeing too many goals allowed by either goalie that I thought were even the least bit their fault.

I know Ruskowski doesn't often keep his goalies, but I'd say there's a real chance he keeps both of these ones, as good goalie stats in the past were usually a product of great defensive play and this year was quite the opposite case.

In other words, I'm down with saying yes to both of them.

Rivet...well, no offense to your assessment, but he did make some mistakes this season. He went from being third among the league's defensemen with a plus-29 last season to registering a minus-1 this year...good for 79th.

He still contributed on the offensive side, but not as much as in the past two seasons (and only one point more than his rookie year, during which he was an astounding plus-39), and I don't really like judging D-men on their points.

However, he is obviously a quality defenseman who cares a heck of a lot about this team (I swear he seemed clinically depressed whenever I talked to him about his struggles and those of the defense overall this season), and he's been here and knows what's up. You need guys like that to teach the new ones who come in year after year.

So, again, I'll agree with your yes.

Miller...well, he's a maybe in my book. Yes, he plays hard and loves battling in the corners. But the fact that he was a healthy scratch in Game 4 should tell you something about what Ruskowski was seeing from him in desperate times. I don't know if I'd say show him the door in quite those terms, but I would say you can find guys who can do the things he does well and then some.

Dixon is indeed a fast skater who hits as hard as he can, and if Ruskowski had any intention to get rid of him, I think he'd have done it in a trade to get something back he wanted for this season. The kid works his butt off no matter what line he's on or how much or little playing time he gets and played his best hockey in the playoffs, which is never a bad sign. I'll second another yes for that one.

And then there is Kozak. At his best, he is definitely a force to be reckoned with. But, like Hiebert, he has a bit of an attitude issue. And, while I have nothing against fighting when there is reason for it, earning unnecessary retaliatory penalties can doom a team.

If he's willing to play the part he is needed to play, manage his temper when he needs to and refrain from breaking his hand on other players' skulls, then keeping him around wouldn't be a bad thing. But, because of all those reasons and the fact that he didn't seem to thrive under postseason pressure, I'm going to mark him a maybe on my list.

If what Snider did in the playoffs is any indication of what he's like as a player overall, I'd have to make him a definite yes. Taking faceoffs was not something he should necessarily have been doing, just something he was needed to do because of the lack of true center iceman on the team. But he is aggressive as heck and very accurate when shooting the puck.

He was just starting to find his place on this team chemistry-wise, though, so having the season end the way it did may not make coming back the most desirable thing for him. Keep in mind he was contacted prior to the season and chose to go a different direction.

As I said in my previous post, if Smith comes back, that's just a shame. I know that some guys get sold on Laredo because of how well they're treated down here, but he should not be in the CHL next year. Of course, if he is, I imagine it'll be here.

Featherstone is pretty much the same deal. He needed a year to get used to the professional game, but he has a great approach to the game and is a very solid defensive defenseman who should be able to move up.

Judd was still in Laredo as of a couple days ago, and I imagine you don't let someone hang around that long if you don't like anything about them. Just like you, I didn't see enough of him to make a strong assessment of his play, but I can't think of any terribly negative things to say about him off the top of my head.

Assessing Zaore is a bit of a connundrum. He could be sloppy at times, and I think his biggest flaw was trying to do too much and making things difficult for himself. But he did obviously miss a bit of time, so he might have thought he needed to do more to make up for that. However, I know that what Ruskowski wanted from him was not what he got, and you need to assess each individual player based on how they play their own game, so I'd put him in the no category.

And finally, Salvis and Lizon.

Salvis has a lot of potential and showed it sometimes but was admittedly a bit invisible at others. However, Ruskowski liked the way he played, and he tried to do what was expected of him in this system. Keep in mind the fact that his linemates were changing constantly and this was his first season at the professional level. I'll make him a maybe.

Lizon was tossed around all over the place but didn't seem to fit quite right no matter where he went. He won some key fights but lost a couple, too, and was definitely expected to be more than just an enforcer. Ruskowski put him on the top line a couple times, for goodness' sake. But I will agree with the no for him.

Overall, one of my biggest concerns with this year's team was the fact that a lot of the guys seemed like they couldn't care less about what happened out there.

As Ruskowski often said, there was no surefire way to get them to put their best effort forward, and plain old potential doesn't win games.

As I assume is obvious enough from things I have written previously, I am not allowed into the Bucks' locker room, and because of that, I only saw one player after last year's season-ending loss to the Arizona Sundogs because they were all too upset to come out.

Yesterday, a couple of them were milling around wanting to talk to their buddies on the Jackalopes and genuinely seeming unaffected by the loss their team had just sustained. I'm not going to name names, so please don't ask, but that definitely had something to do with my responses.

Sorry this post is of epic length, but hopefully that answered your question.