Murray has been skating again and may play out the last couple of games in the 2014-15 regular season. In a season that has been rendered essentially useless, I ask myself this question: why the hell risk him to possible further injury?
Most people will argue that hockey is a contact sport that exposes players to possible injury all the time which is a fair point but the discussion should be more nuanced than that. Murray is already considered by many, one of the best defenseman on the team at the young age of 21. He has many more years ahead of him and is finding himself in a precarious spot with his injury history.
The reason that has been given by the Blue Jackets front office is that he needs this time to further his development. Which part of his development needs to be accelerated in the last fifteen games or so? He has already gone through the student/mentor role with Wisniewski and they found great chemistry together. He may have shown enough to the front office that the mentor was no longer needed for the student to succeed on the team. Do they want to see what he can bring to a top four without Wisniewski? Pair him up with a younger right handed defensemen? David Savard? Cody Goloubef?
Maybe they want to put Murray in a leadership role to possibly prop him up as a figure head in the locker room? Possibly preserve his toughness to teammates who may be questioning his sturdiness as a cornerstone franchise-type defensemen?
The questions keep growing around him but with all that being said what do you think should be done with Murray?
Do you think that Murray should be playing when available so he can get time to develop his game in his young career?
Or are you on the other side of the spectrum with me and think they should start again next year? Let him get his strength and conditioning up, try again next year when the games mean more to the team.
It seems like the team is doing a mix of the two by taking extra precaution with how they deal with Murray but also want him to be healthy enough to get some games in before the season ends.
You are the armchair GM, what do you do?
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
