The key moment for Nazem Kadri came not with the Toronto Maple Leafs, but with the Toronto Marlies, their minor-league affiliate. It came in a meeting with Dallas Eakins, the kind of meeting coaches often have with skilled players about the other side of the game.

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Simply telling Kadri what to do wasn't working, so Eakins started asking questions: "If you were your opponent in this situation, what would you want Nazem Kadri to do? What would you not want Nazem Kadri to do?" Kadri discovered that he knew the answers – where to go when you don't have the puck, how to manage the puck when you have it, and why.

"I would say to Naz, 'You should be the best defensive player on our team, because you know every offensive trick there is,' " Eakins said. "Then suddenly it started to click. We just had to teach him a different way."

So when was this epiphany? When Kadri played for the Marlies during the lockout? Is that why the seventh overall pick in the 2009 draft looks like he's now in the NHL to stay at 22 years old, leading the Leafs in scoring and playing a more complete game a quarter of the way through the season? Not exactly.

"It was a couple years ago," Eakins said.

This is a story about development. Every player is different, every situation is different and the path to the NHL is not necessarily a straight line even for a top-10 pick. Players have to learn how to fit in. Coaches have to learn how to fit them in. It has been a particularly delicate dance in Toronto for Kadri.

The Leafs love having their AHL affiliate in the same city. It's great for logistics. It's great for marketing. It's great for motivating players. As the Marlies' slogan goes: "Every game is a tryout." Problem is, when a player goes from the Leafs to the Marlies, he goes from Toronto to Toronto. He cannot lick his wounds in obscurity in, say, Binghamton. He suffers his embarrassment in the same fishbowl from whence he came. Every demotion is dissected.

"Boy, it's wonderful when you get called up," Eakins said. "But when you get sent down, it's not like you're out of there."

Now consider Kadri. He was born in London, Ontario. He starred for the London Knights of the Ontario Hockey League. He became the top prospect for a team lacking top-end talent that hadn't made the playoffs since 2004 and hadn't won the Stanley Cup since 1967 in the Center of the Hockey Universe – a perfect storm of pressure. When he had three goals and five points in six preseason games in 2009, just before he turned 19 and returned to junior, it only raised expectations.

[Y! Sports Radio: Nick Cotsonika assesses the first month of the NHL season]

But Kadri struggled in the preseason in 2010 and went to the Marlies, and he spent two seasons shuttling up and down. Ron Wilson, the Leafs' coach most of that time, didn't mince words about Kadri's deficiencies in public or in private. Randy Carlyle, who replaced Wilson late last season, said he knew all about the Kadri drama – while he was coaching the Ducks out in Anaheim. If you paid attention to hockey, you couldn't help but hear about it.

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