Josh Samanski

Last Season

Two goals and four points in 24 games as a rookie, plus-two, on ten and a half minutes a night, with nine shots on goal all season. Those are fourth-line numbers in a fourth-line role, and they are also the first NHL games of his career.

The Finesse Game

There is very little NHL evidence to go on. Nine shots in 24 games says a player who is not looking to shoot and is being asked to play a simple, containing game — chip it in, get on the forecheck, change.

He is 6-2 and skates well enough to hold a fourth-line job, and the coaching staff trusted him enough to keep dressing him, which for an undrafted rookie is its own kind of endorsement.

The Physical Game

Two hundred pounds and willing. He is not a punishing forechecker but he finishes checks and gets to the areas he is asked to get to.

The Intangibles

Undrafted players who reach the NHL at twenty-four have almost always done it on habits rather than talent, and the safe assumption is that this is what he is: a coachable, positionally sound depth center who does what he is told.

Whether there is anything more than that is genuinely unknown. The sample is twenty-four games.