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Trotz: Slow start has Weber “a little bit frustrated”

SheaWeber

It hasn’t been a great start to the season for Shea Weber.

The All-Star defenseman is scoreless through six games with a minus-1 rating.

His team has just one regulation win and sits last in the Central Division.

Put it all together and you have a frustrated player -- something head coach Barry Trotz recognizes.

“I think Webs is a little bit frustrated,” Trotz told The Tennessean. “He wants to do so well. It’s not that he’s doing a lot of bad things, but I think there’s a little bit of a level of frustration in his game right now that holds him back a little bit.”

It’s been a season of change for both Weber and the Preds. Gone is Weber’s longtime defensive partner, Ryan Suter, replaced by the relatively inexperienced Roman Josi (who had just 52 career games under his belt coming into 2013.)

The Preds are also without a number of players from last year’s team. Andrei Kostitsyn, Jordin Tootoo, Francis Bouillon, Anders Lindback and Alex Radulov are all plying their trades elsewhere, and former 30-goal scorer Patric Hornqvist is out with injury.

Things don’t promise to get any easier in the near future.

The Preds are in the midst of a seven-game road trip -- they’re 1-2-1 thus far -- and still have dates in Los Angeles, San Jose and St. Louis. All told, Nashville will play four of its next five games on the road, not exactly what a team looking to reverse its slow start needs for a reversal of fortune.