Head coach Craig Ramsay acknowledged Wednesday there have been issues with Bogosian's learning curve under a new coaching staff. And there has been some conflict with assistant coach John Torchetti, who deals with the team's defensemen.
"I don't think that John is mean to him. I don't think he's overly vocal with him. I think John is just trying to do what he thinks is best for Zach and for everyone," Ramsay said.
"I trust John to pass on the appropriate information in the appropriate way. I think misunderstandings occurred that have been dealt with and I see nothing but good things," the coach said.
For his part, Bogosian didn't have much to say about his relationship with Torchetti, who joined Ramsay's staff this past offseason after being behind the bench with the Stanley Cup-winning Chicago Blackhawks last year.
"It's between me and him," Bogosian told ESPN.com this week.
"It's not a huge deal where I'm losing any sleep over it," he added.
Bogosian, big, strong and fleet of foot, admitted this season has been trying.
"It has been an up-and-down year for me," he said.
Bogosian has been forced to take on a different role with the emergence of Tobias Enstrom and Dustin Byfuglien as elite power-play performers.
Byfuglien and Enstrom are first and second in team scoring with a combined 83 points and, when healthy, dominate the power-play time allotted by the Thrashers' coaching staff.
For a guy who's used to being one of the best players on any team on which he's played, that dynamic has been sobering for Bogosian.
With Enstrom out with a broken finger, Bogosian has been asked to do more and he has responded, Ramsay said.
In the team's last game, a loss to Toronto, Ramsay said he thought Bogosian looked as good as he has all year.
"I think he understands, I hope he understands, I believe he understands that we're only here to make him better. That's our only thought. We don't show him mistakes because we want him to be a bad player. We want him to understand how small the differences can be that would prevent those errors and would allow him to have some fun," Ramsay said.
I've never noticed an issue it looked to me like my sweet boy and our awesome coaches got along great, Torchetti even playfully man handled Zach both of course laughing. So the whole thing confused me but I'll respect Zach's wishes and let him be the adult and handle it.
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