Scott Stevens Adds to the Wild’s Defense Without Taking Anything Away

Darryl Sydor, one of the Wild’s old assistant coaches, said something last year that stuck with me; “We don’t have a lot of physical D, but we have a lot of smart D.” In context, Russo quoted him when Mike Reilly was initially called up and Sydor was coaching him while they sat in the press box during one of the games. Quite often over the years, I’ve heard from various kinds of fans that the Wild’s defender’s were weak or gutless and should be traded for pucks and picks. We didn’t have a Dustin Byfuglien or a Zdeno Chara, and thus our defense was inadequate, or something. Then along came Sydor, who pointed out to Reilly that both Jared Spurgeon and Jonas Brodin were very successful defensively without throwing around their bodies. You and I may have already known that, but between all the #Grit starved fans and coaches out there, it was quite refreshing to hear a coach recognize the best aspects of the players available and use them accordingly.

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