2017-18 First Annual Anaheim Ducks “Quackie” Awards – Part Two
Pucks of Feather rewards excellence. Its why we created the Anaheim Ducks Quackie awards. We hand out two more awards today.
We had originally planned to announce five award winners today but decided to spread the fun out one more day. If you haven’t read the Anaheim Ducks Quackie Awards part one, you can here.
Disappointing Player of the Year
3rd Place – Kevin Bieksa. “What a drag it is getting old” – Rolling Stones, Mother’s Little Helper. Last season father time was creeping up on Kevin Bieksa. This season Bieksa got caught. He may be 36 years old, but many times he looked more like 46. Too often the former Bowling Green Falcon looked lost on the ice when covering his man. Additionally, his eight points were the lowest in his career since he was a rookie in 2005-06.
2nd Place – Antoine Vermette. He had several chances this season to show that he could still be a valuable contributor in 2017-18. The Anaheim Ducks opened the season missing their two top centers. Vermette played with the team’s best wings, but couldn’t generate much offense for himself. As the season progressed his ice time decreased. In the final months of the season, he was a regular spectator, watching from the press box. Vermette will be 36 when the new season starts, he may have played his last game in North America.
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1st Place – Nick Ritchie. So much potential, so much agonizing disappointment. Ritchie reminds me of a round of golf. No matter how bad your round is, you usually hit just enough good shots to come back to the course again. Ritchie does just enough good things on the ice to make the coaches and fans think that he might be a better than average player.
Then Ritchie makes a bad play or takes a stupid penalty and everyone throws their hands up in disgust. At this point, the former 10th overall draft pick in 2016 looks like he is going to be a role player at best. The Ducks would be wise to move on from him this offseason.
Breakout Player of the Year
2nd place – Ondrej Kase. The more Ondrej Kase plays, the better he gets. Anaheim’s former seventh-round draft pick (2014), scored 20 goals and added 18 assists in 66 games during 2017-18. A step up from his15 points in 55 games the previous season.
More important than the numbers, was the spark Kase provided to the lineup on many nights. His partnership with Adam Henrique and Nick Ritchie added another potent line to the Ducks.
1st place – Derek Grant. Nine months ago, If someone had told you that Derek Grant would be the Ducks Breakout Player of the Year. You would have said, Who? Exactly.
Grant came out of absolutely nowhere to become an important member of the Anaheim Ducks. Up until October, he played 86 NHL games with four different teams over five seasons. There was no reason to think Grant would even make the Ducks, let alone stay with the team all season.
Next: April 2018 Pucks of a Feather Mailbag
He did more than stay with the team this season, scoring 24 points in 68 games. Additionally, he won 53% of his faceoffs, was a mainstay on the Anaheim penalty kill, and chipped in three power-play goals. Grant didn’t have a breakout, he had an explosion.