Parsnip’s Success: Beyond the Numbers | [Your Brand]

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He was only nineteen. But coach Vladimír Vůjtek had no doubts about how he would deal with David Pastrňák. In 2016, the attacker from Boston came to the first adult representative event. “I thought that one day he would grow up to be a great player,” Vůjtek nods. At the World Cup in Russia, he prepared a role for him in the first attack.

“Pasta had great talent, but here he was still at the beginning. I still wanted to see him with experienced players,” recalled Vůjtek, why he placed him with Tomáš Plekanec and Roman Červenko.

“They complemented each other well. Only David was not yet as effective as a shooter as he is now,” smiles the coach. “Really, how many goals did he score in the NHL at that point? Twenty?” Vůjtek asks.

Aiming well. Twenty five. After less than ten years, the striker is at number 410.

At the World Cup, Pastrňák scored one goal, paradoxically, he scored for the first time against Sweden, where he grew up in hockey, and the Czech Republic was eliminated in the quarterfinals.

Back then, the Boston forward acted in the role of a talented fighter who could do great things one day.

Today he is in the position of a player who seriously makes them. He became the most brilliant Czech hockey player in the world. At least once every week he causes something in the NHL, which makes his name adorn the headlines of Czech websites.

He surpassed Patrik Eliáš in the number of goals and only Jaromír Jágr is ahead of him. From Saturday to Sunday, Pastrňák collected six goals during the demolition of the New York Rangers, which no Czech player in history has achieved. No, not even Jagr.

So what kind of player is Pastrňák? On the one hand, a fairly simple answer: the best shooter, the most capable playmaker, the most distinctive persona on the ice, the most technical player.

It doesn’t matter if you put Boston or the Czech national team behind the term. David Pastrňák has a privileged role, whatever jersey he pulls over his head. He became a prominent star who got used to having all the attention fixed on him and should arrange the result.

He was also asked what his closer was after the 10-2 cannonade against the Rangers and the aforementioned six records.

“I like to make the play when I was growing up at home, that was my role. But in the NHL, it turned around a little bit,” he replied. “Usually when I see someone in a better position, I try to pass,” he added. But when someone charges at him, he doesn’t think stupid things, but hits the puck into the net.

When asked the same question by Seznam Zpráv, Petr Nedvěd, one of the most prominent Czech hockey players in the NHL and also the former general manager of the national team, went a little further with the answer: “There are many things that decorate him on the ice. But his positive energy in the cabin and on the substitution table? A big factor that will blow the rest away, which is not in the statistics.”

Pastrňák’s ability to score goals, regardless of who is next to him, should not disappear in the number of passes and great loops.

Even at the current pace, he should finish the season somewhere with 37 goals. For the first time since the 2018/19 season, he would not reach at least 40 hits in a complete season. But his second halves are usually much better, he can add. He can attack the limit of 45 goals.

In the last three seasons, Pastrňák has used 151 of them, although Boston has weakened significantly recently. Patrice Bergeron and David Krejčí – star center forwards who started with the Czech ace – gradually retired. Brad Marchand went to Florida for the Stanley Cup.

It was expected that this would mainly affect the number of chances Pastrňák would get, his goal numbers would drop.

But as far as the goal production itself is concerned, he was not dependent on the legends of Boston. As favorite team-mates left, the number 88 striker became more independent.

The greatest contribution to the aforementioned 151 goals was made by Pavel Zacha, who was involved in forty goals. As a result, Pastrňák was more likely to score goals for Marchand, because he directly scored 20 goals for him (Marchand scored 12 for him). But it turned out that Pastrňák doesn’t really need stars around him.

As a result, he can “produce” them, which the best players in the world can do. In the hot season, he worked out 10 of the 25 goals scored by Morgan Geekie. The Canadian has grown so much that he was talked about in connection with the nomination for the Olympics. It didn’t get to him, but the story well shows Pastrňák’s powerful charm.

However, what fascinates Pastrňák most is his ability to shoot regularly without the assistance of the NHL’s biggest stars, as only Jaromír Jágr was able to do among the Czech players. He creates enough chances himself. “There are things that can be improved during a career, which is also shooting,” responds Petr Nedvěd. “But at the same time, you need to be born with a certain gift. A lot of players work on themselves, but they get a chance and they don’t know how to score. Pasta does.”

Nedved knows what he is talking about. He scored 310 goals in the NHL, which makes him the tenth best Czech hockey player in history.

Scoring 30 or more goals for the first time can still be a pretty easy feat against what comes after. There is a direct correlation: more goals, more attention from opponents. The coaches of the opposing team are preparing videos of where and how you finish. All with a clear objective to minimize the chance of you scoring.

For example, Nedvěd scored over 30 goals four times in his career. But in his era in the mid-1990s, different rules applied than today. There were big, bad Derian Hatcher-type creatures roaming around the gates. “You had a much better chance to clip the wings of talented players. Hooking and possession were completely different. It’s beautiful when I see how the boys play in front of the goal today. Anyone who was there in our time got ten small balls in the back and head,” Nedvěd just smiles.

In the 80s, in the era of another great scorer, Miroslav Fryčer, the game was played in a completely different mode. Overseas tested what the Europeans could endure, it was common to end the match in blood. Many times even their own coaches had contempt for hockey players outside of America.

That’s why the absolute shooting numbers can be nicely compared side by side, but you can’t measure who is the best scorer in Czech NHL history by them.

“I don’t want to shout that players have it easier today. But players with the kind of talent that Pasta has have the advantage that the NHL rules are against them. They want their talent to be seen, which is right,” says Nedvěd. “If you’re a talented player, you have room to excel. I’m not complaining, I’m just stating the fact that it was different in our time.”

When he briefly dreams of playing in the NHL now, he quite enjoys the idea. “I’d be able to breathe better. Or else, I’d have a chance to pass the gate, take a breath and not get in the ribs,” he smiles.

Would he also score 400 goals? And Fryčer even more if he played in the NHL in a more friendly time? And where would Petr Klíma end up?

But there is also a difference in the current league, which favors offensive players. Immobile monsters became extinct because they no longer had any use. So? “The difference today is that there isn’t such a gap between a top NHL player and the rest of the league. Everyone who plays in the competition already has a good movement,” Nedvěd returns to reality.

That Pastrňák is most decorated with nature, instinct. It was well seen, for example, in an interview with NESN, where the reporter discussed with him an exceptionally hard and accurate shot from the first.

“David, what is most important to her?” asked the question.

“Recording,” Havířov’s protege grinned.

But then he started talking about the hockey stick on the ice, shots from the tip of the hockey stick and other details. However, his attitude towards the subject, which shooters he admired himself as a little boy, is more telling about his inner hockey laws.

“Honestly speaking, I didn’t have anyone I admired, I just played hockey,” Pastrňak answered honestly. “The most important thing for me was when I started playing street hockey. Once I started playing with that orange ball, all of a sudden you get to shoot a lot. You have an opportunity, you shoot. My shooting has improved a lot since then.”

While those around him and analysts try to define his finish and dissect where his greatest strength lies, to him it’s just a game.

“When I watched him already at the World Championship in Russia, I could see that he takes hockey as fun. Not lightly, that he doesn’t care what happens and how the match turns out. But as honest fun,” adds Vůjtek.

Pastrňák does not have supernatural abilities and sometimes the opponent is simply a bit better, you can’t move with that. But he can overturn balanced matches with his exceptionality, and it is good to see it in the national team as well. This is where Nedvěd is heading.

He was part of two big plays that pushed the national team to a big medal.

At the World Cup in Prague, Pastrňák was not fit, he did not score goals. But the coach reassured Rulík that it would come from him. In the final, he leaned into Tomáš Kundrátek’s pass, scored the winning goal, and the Czech Republic went for the gold.

At the World Cup in 2022, the national team lost 1:3 in the match for bronze. The turnaround to 8:4 was also successful thanks to Pastrňák’s hat trick. If he played well in the tournament, this was the match in which he flew.

“When your leaders behave like this, the rest of the team will join in. When you become an NHL star, there is really enough stress around you. But Pasta works with him great. The team only benefits from it,” says Nedvěd.

From time to time it happens that Pastrňák, McDavid and MacKinnon stop collecting points or scoring goals.

“You always have a few stupid matches and it’s clear that you think about them. But you just need to park this somewhere and think about the things that are yet to come. I can learn a lesson when something didn’t work out for me. But then again, there’s no point in exaggerating it, because you can’t change the past,” Nedvěd explains the thinking of the biggest stars.

He played for the New York Rangers with Wayne Gretzky, in Pittsburgh with Mario Lemieux and Jaromir Jagr. He saw the biggest personalities live side by side. “You are a finished hockey player. So you can’t come to training and start solving that you can’t actually shoot, you can’t skate and you have to change everything. If you have Pasta’s level, you are an exceptional player, you can do almost everything at the highest level,” he explains a key detail from the stars’ thinking.

At the absolute top, it is no longer decided by faster feet or more skillful hands. “Like if you look at the ranking of the best tennis players in the world. As far as skills are concerned, there are absolutely minimal differences between them. The only thing that decides is the head. That’s all,” adds Petr Nedvěd.

Remember his line the next time Pastrňák amazes everyone again. It will be soon.