By now, you?ve seen, or haven?t, Corrado?s comments about his Vancouver experience, comments which suggested that he didn?t think he was treated very fairly by the current Canucks management team and their coaching staff.
Q: Did you get a fair shake here?
Corrado:
?That is a tough one.
?If I look at my whole time here, coming in and playing the (2013) playoffs, injuries made that happen, but I earned that chance.
?In (2014), another coaching change and another fresh start. That was another year where maybe (I was) a little slow out of the gate. But do really well in the American League and get called up a bunch of times, and not play, which was really frustrating.
?Then, have a great playoffs with Utica. Do what you?re told to do. Have a good playoff run, it will be good experience.
?Battle through injuries. Freeze your bones. Play through separated shoulders. Finish playing June 15. Come to training camp, and all of a sudden ?You?re not ready.?
?It was really frustrating. That?s the way I see it."
Now, when he was done, we shared one of those ?oh shit, this changes things? looks you get sometimes.
In his answer there was a revelation that?s a bit of a game changer, in the way the story has been told to this point.
And that would be the comment ?separated shoulder.?
To this point, no one knew that Corrado suffered a separated shoulder during the playoffs and played through it. It depends on degree, but generally it?s a 3-5 week rehab for NHL players before they can play again.
Q: Did that impact you for weeks?
Corrado:
Months.
?It happened in the first round. It was Game 3 against Chicago. At home. I separated my shoulder. I played the rest of the playoffs with it.
?It?s one of those things that take a long time to heal. Throughout the summer, especially when you have a late summer like that, there wasn?t much I could do.
?I had to let it heal. When it got time where I could really push it, it was basically training camp.?
Corrado missed five games during the playoffs. Missing those games was not because of the separated shoulder.
In fact, in Round 2, Corrado broke his hand. The five games he missed were spent icing it.
So, he just played through a broken hand and a separated shoulder and was given up on by a team who concluded he had a poor training camp even though he couldn?t work out in the summer?
That?s some story, and it changes the complexion of what went down.
It also was a reason Corrado didn?t play much with the Leafs when he arrived.
?It was easier in (Toronto) because there was a plan. I knew they had a plan for me.
?They had a picture of when they wanted me to play.
?Knowing that there was a group who had a plan for me, made things easier.
?They talked to me, let me know.
??Keep getting stronger,? they said.
?The time off, I got a lot of time to work out and that helped because I missed the time in the summer.?
