Adam Foote provides an update on Thatcher Demko, Teddy Blueger, and more
That sounds like it might be a story. What can you tell us about that? Not here today. It’s It’s not a story, but I’ll explain it to you. Um, you know, he we asked him this summer when we had conversation with him uh to take care of himself and know in a condensed schedule when he feels he needs, you know, a t a little bit of time off and that’s what he’s doing. Um I don’t want to say words that you people don’t like or like a maintenance or whatever but um you know I’ll give you an example. You play a long time you it’s not thatcher but say you have a back surgery and early in your career as if you get a chance to play a long time you know in your last seven years five years the latter half of your career there’s times where you can feel something else comp hope like compensation right so you know you might have to have a maintenance day or some time to work on something. So that’s it. That’s all. So, um, and he’s he’s such a great leader that he doesn’t want to ever miss a day. And, uh, you know, even his teammates in the summer and the leadership are like one thing we always talked about was Denver, you got to know when to go and take care of you in a certain situation and and and he’s doing what we asked him to do. And, uh, I like that. Is he an option for this weekend then? He may be. We’ll see. Uh, we’ll see. Like, we’re going to go with this thing as we wake up every morning, right? And that’s just the way I approach things anyway as a as a person. So could Kevin Langman play back to back if he has to? Well, if if he has to, he has to. So we’re not there yet. So would would you say that he has an injury right now or is this preventative? No. Sure. Want me explain it again? No, I’m not trying to embarrass you. No, no, no. I I So what I heard is that you’re you’re trying to make sure that he’s taking care of himself and that’s and that’s what this is. Like if you I had a back surgery my second year pro. Okay. I was you know you know what I did. So as my career went in the travel and the tough minutes and you know things like that I had to be responsible when I go to the and the coaches trusted me or my strength coach trusted me when to take uh a day and that’s that’s all he’s got to take care of himself and and I you know we I respect that. He’s he’s going to take care of making sure that he’s in a condensed schedule. We got him at his at his best. For so long, hockeyy’s sort of been that sort of suck it up, deal with it, you know, get over it, you know, and with this condensed schedule, I mean, this it’s so hard to recover. No, no, I’m just saying so hard to recover. This sounds like what in the end it’s this is a guy who’s sore and saying no, no, that like to his benefit like you should take a rest. Hockeyy’s that with a stick in the mouth, a broken nose, but like you know there’s certain things you got to just deal with and take care of that are completely different things, right? If a guy gets a stick in the mouth or six stitches, he goes back and play or lose six teeth, he goes back and play. That’s a completely different thing that’ll always probably be in hockey. But yes, you’re right. But yeah, the schedule. We saw Teddy at the Morning Skate the other day and there was some hope that he was going to be part of a practice. He wasn’t here this morning. Yeah. Where is he? He wanted to be part of this practice, but he’s not ready. Like he’s getting practice ice, right? And when he’s getting closer to play, he’ll be in a full practice. because we have less practices. We were like, for example, we did some OTP with two lines today and after practice, two other lines are doing it, right? It’s more of walkthroughs where you’re not putting wear on the players, but you’re getting some touches and things things done. So, same as Teddy is because we’re so condensed, we don’t have a ton of practices, we can’t have five lines out in my opinion, when we’re trying to run through reps through other guys, we’ll give him those reps with our skills coach and things like that, but when he’s he’s ready, we’d like to get him in. You know, if we say two practice before his next game, well, the way it’s going, it might be a 16- day gap because we had, so we can’t say that. So, I might be at times, you think I’m contradicting myself, but it’s just because we are in a Olympic year. It’s condensed. And what about Leer Mackey andorlander? Are they skating yet? Leer skating. Um, I think he’s getting close. Is he um he’s progressing ahead of schedule with what he’s doing, but he’s uh he’s not close to practicing. What about Philip Adam? Phil’s got some he’s gotten better, but he’s not yet doing workouts and things like that. Is Phil here? Is he in He’s been in and out. Yeah. Yeah. It looked like a new spot for Brock at practice. Is it just Yeah. moving guys around and trying to find some things that are working for you? Yeah. Yep. Yep. For sure. Uh he You guys saw where he was on the left and we put the Bruska on the right on the other line. Yep. You tend to take up all your lines, Adam, but the one line you kept together has been the fourth line. What have you liked from them and what do they need to to stay together as a line? I think they just play well together. I mean, they bring a good um pace. They bring a good forch check and whether they’re they’re a line that can do it. There’s five minutes of ice or 10. Um they’re always ready to go, right? So, I don’t want to disrupt that right now. I mean, um we we’ll see what happens with uh you know, the rest of the lineup as we move forward. What do you want the guys to focus on this back to back weekend? just just one game at a time. The process we’re we’re right there like we they know what they did the first two periods of last game. You know, they you know, you if you get 21 scoring chances in two periods, you’re you’re doing the right things. And they did.
Vancouver Canucks Head Coach Adam Foote spoke with media following the club’s practice at Rogers Arena on Friday.
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