Progress comes differently for every player. Some young hockey players frequently exceed expectations until they’re instant National Hockey League superstars. Others take what’s known as the Mark Giordano Route, where they start off under the hockey world’s radar and quietly become blue-chippers over a longer period of time.
While he’s missed essentially a season and a half of his first three seasons of pro hockey, Calgary Flames defender Juuso Valimaki continues to trend distinctly upward in his young NHL career.
The past
A product of Nokia, Finland – a suburb of Tampere – Valimaki excelled at hockey from a young age.