Let’s watch Sammy Walker do crazy stuff

It’s a phenomenon that I cannot describe. Some players have it immediately and others take some time to work on it over their summers to come back for the regular season and it is apparent that something is different with this guy.

I’m talking about the whole thing about a player so wonderfully frantic on the ice and looking cool as hell while doing it.

The whole aspect of it is hard to pin down and describe in a few words, but once you see a player that does it, you know exactly what I’m talking about. It’s the kind of player that you just love seeing work harder than most on the ice but has the skill to hold on to the puck and make defenders look foolish.

Last night, in his second ever NHL game and playing for his hometown Minnesota Wild, winger Sammy Walker became one of Those Guys.

On multiple occasions against the Edmonton Oilers, Walker appeared to just be thinking a billion times faster than anyone else on the ice. If the word frantic didn’t have some bad connotations associated with it, I would use it more than in the second paragraph of this blog.

Walker has not produced a point in the NHL yet — he was close to getting an assist on Monday but they took it away from him — but you can tell his first is going to be on some insane play he makes along the boards. He will probably make some poor defender fall to the ice too.

This is just some insane agility. I swear he is going to blossom into something very soon and we are going to be so lucky that Walker decided to stay close to home.

Some of his plays are just not going to work out like he had it in his mind. That’s the nature of trying the risky manuevers — but we just hope and pray that whatever head coach is responsible for him does not get overly upset at him trying this stuff. He is creating so much more than your typical grinder or college free agent.

It is crazy to think of what his potential ceiling can be; but we are saying this after just two games in the NHL and a very good start to his rookie AHL season. Maybe we need to temper expectations or limit them to just being able to see a local player do some cool stuff on the ice.

After all, once Ryan Hartman and Brandon Duhaime return to the lineup, Walker will take his talents to Iowa once again and try to build upon an electric start. We’ll have to wait until he’s needed once again or next season for him to be back in St. Paul for a little bit longer.

Either way, he is already near the top of our favorite players to watch on this team. He just looks like he’s trying so hard but also able to pull off some sick moves! It rocks.