Brady Tkachuk should wear the 'C' with a chip on his shoulder
Gonna say the thing nobody here wants to hear: if Stützle keeps outproducing Brady by 15 points a season, the C stops being a question and starts being overdue. I love Brady, I really do, but 57 points from your captain while the kid's hitting 70+? That's a tough look, and the CTC knows it. Half the building chants Tiiim already and everyone heard it.
That said, I don't think you rip the letter off a guy's chest because one season went sideways. Brady takes the abuse in front of the net and sets the tone, and that stuff shows up in April more than in the points column. Give him the summer to get the chip back on the shoulder. If next year Timmy outplays him again? Hand it over and don't look back. Anyone betting against Timmy taking the C eventually, feel free to DM me, I'll give you odds that only look good for me 😏
Since when does the C go to the top scorer? Stützle's 21 and still learning to defend his own zone, while Brady drags teams through the mud in front of the net and eats the tough minutes. Show me the numbers on who actually plays the hard matchups, points alone won't convince me.
Nah, you don't hand the C to a 21-year-old cause the chants got loud tbh 😤 I was at the CTC the night Brady dropped the gloves after a dirty hit and the whole building lost it - that's the captain right there. Timmy's the future, no argument, but Brady drags this team through the mud every night and I'm backing him all day 💪🔥
Heart with the team, head on pause.
Funny how everyone points at Brady's 57 and forgets what the C actually pays for. Tim's 70+ looks great on the scoresheet, sure, butFanatic_Life is right - show me Tim eating the hard matchups every second shift and dragging the room after a loss. I tracked shift quality all season and the tape backs Brady; small sample though, one more year of Tim's two-way game and we can talk.
I keep my own tables 📊
Back when Alfie wore the C here, folks wanted it off him every time the team sputtered, and look how that aged. A captain isn't the points leader. Gary's story about Brady dropping the gloves says more than 57 or 70 ever will. Let Tim grow into it; the letters sort themselves out eventually. 😉
Skeptical of the whole "points decide the C" take, honestly. Stützle might be producing more, but does anyone seriously think a 21-year-old runs that room better than Brady, who's been eating the tough assignments since he got the letter? Show me Tim shutting down a top line night after night and I'll reconsider, on condition that someone actually posts those usage numbers instead of chanting louder.
Hype isn't an argument.
KevReds nails the Alfie comparison. My only caveat: watch the dip last season, because if 57 becomes a trend rather than a blip, that room reads it too. 📊
Do the math before you argue.
Brady wears the C and it stays that way, anyone crying about 57 points can put their money where their mouth is. Remind me of your ROI? 😏
Show me your ROI first 😏
Nah, keep the C on Brady tbh 🔥 Tim's what, 21? Let him cook without that weight yet... one down year and everyone panics 😤 heart says it all with Brady 💪
On the terraces since I was a kid.
chloe, hearts don't win you faceoffs in april 😄 i love brady too, sat through enough cold nights at the ctc cheering him on, but alfie took the C young and grew into it, tim's already the best player on this team and everyone in that room knows it. one down year from brady and suddenly the letters sewn on out of loyalty? i've seen it all before with rebuilds, keep the C where the future is.
Been here longer than some have followed.
BadBeat, you're arguing best player equals captain, and I'm not convinced that equation holds. Tim at 21 getting the C mostly means he gets to absorb the media scrums after every loss - Brady already does that job and his game drops when he's pressing. RideOrDieZone's caveat is the one worth watching: if 57 repeats next spring, then we talk. I'll believe a changing of the guard when I see it, and right now all I see is one down season.
Numbers are honest, takes aren't.
Kev, you've got my vote here, and I say that as someone who's tracked Brady's shifts game by game since he arrived. The captaincy tax is real. You watch the post-loss scrums and his game gets tighter the following week, and that showed up in the 57-point dip. But I'll add a caveat to my own agreement: one down season is a small sample, and Stützle's 70+ came with some generous zone starts and a soft schedule stretch in January. I keep my own tables every round, and Tim's underlying numbers weren't a full class above Brady even in a "down" year.
So my position lands closer to yours than to Enforcer's, the C doesn't need to move today. What I'd want is Brady playing angry in a good way again, the way he did when he first got the letter. My dad and I drive in from outside Regina for a game every winter, and the last two trips, honestly, the "Tiiim" chants felt like a fact on the tape, not just noise. That pressure exists whether we hand over the title or delay it.
I keep my own tables 📊
Funny thing, I was updating my spreadsheet this morning — the one I keep every season. And stopped at the Tkachuk column for 2023-24. Fifty-seven points stares back at you, and next to it Stützle's 70-something, and it's tempting to just draw a line through Brady's name and hand the C over. But there's a nuance here. Jack's point about the captaincy tax matches what I see on tape: Brady presses, he takes more of those finishing-checks-for-the-sake-of-it shifts, and the offence dries up. That's a job-description problem, and you don't fix a workload problem by adding a second guy to carry it.
Small sample though. One down year against several where he dragged this group by the collar. And Stützle at 21 getting the C means every post-loss scrum in that rink lands on him before his game has calluses. Depends how you count it, honestly: do you measure the letter by who produces most, or by who absorbs the pressure best?