The 31-year-old Los Angeles Kings defenseman Drew Doughty is well aware of the criticisms of him and he intends to set the record straight and become the cornerstone he once was.
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While the Kings are in the midst of a rebuilding process, they have missed the playoffs for the past two seasons. A situation Doughty had never experienced before.
Over both of these campaigns, the 2016 Norris Trophy winner showed a cumulative differential of -50. But in his eyes, he can still be dominant in the National Hockey League (NHL).
“A lot of people don’t think of me as a good player anymore,” he said on a video conference recently. And so it all becomes personal and it all pushes me to be better this year to make our team better. ”
“The last few years have been very hard, I have never experienced something like this in my life,” he said. I say it like it’s the end of the world and it’s not. But it sucks to lose and I obviously feel a lot responsible for that. “
Frustrating
Doughty spent most of the long forced break in Canada, and he admitted to watching Canadian sports networks very often. When he heard certain analyzes about him, his motivation was only reinforced.
“I saw guys who didn’t fit me into Olympic roster,” said Doughty. And that frustrates me. I don’t hear that from my peers. Never. So it’s the media. You can check if you want to see it. “
Either way, Doughty feels that this break has been good for him as he is now in great shape. He now wants to be able to enjoy a little more stability to start this season well.
That could be the case since he was paired with newly graduated Olli Maatta from the Chicago Blackhawks on day one of training camp.
“I don’t want to find excuses. But when you play with six or seven different partners, it’s hard to find rhythm. With Olli, I think we can play together not only this season, but for several seasons to come. ”
“He is intelligent. He’s a veteran in this league. He pays attention to details. He will have assimilated all the systems [de jeu] by the weekend no problem. This is probably already the case. But it’s just exciting because we play the same way. We are thinking. We’re not necessarily the fastest skaters. ”
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