Quote:
Originally Posted by Tinordi
Yeah I don't get the love for Ristolainen either he's got pretty mediocre to bad underlying stats. I don't put him above any of the defencemen on this list for sure.
|
For me its his combination of skill, skating, size and toughness. If he fully rounds out he could be the next Chris Pronger. I think his upside is higher than almost any of the young defensemen being talked about here. That said he is less polished than some of them as well. But hey Pronger wasn't a Norris nominee early in his career. Sometimes the huge guys take a little while to get comfortable and grow into their upside.
We've seen a lot of growth in Hamilton's game so far and he's older than Ristolainen, no reason to think Ristolainen cannot continue to improve and reduce mistakes. Or to use another example right now Ekblad is the better player for sure, but I think Ekblad doesn't have a lot of room to improve his game. Ristolainen could be one of the best dmen in the league in a few years IMO as he can do it all. He can play the skill game on the powerplay, he can rush the puck, he can punish guys, he can physically dominate small forwards with his size. But its a gamble to take Ristolainen over some of the more polished guys. So in these lists it depends on how you're thinking about it. Sure some people like Resurrection try to view the list as who will do the best ONLY considering next season. But I think a lot of us view the list as who would we build a team around, who will have the best career.
I guess your list would be influenced by whether you value size, strength and physicality in a defensemen because I think that's the reason why some people think he should be on here and some think he shouldn't. If you don't value physicality and strength then of course he's not as appealing. If you do then you might be of the opinion that gives him an edge in upside over defensemen who will never be considered physical. I happen to think Ristolainen's upside is about as high as any of the young defensemen. He hasn't achieved it yet and there's no guarantee he will but I see room to grow into a monster. If you're talking about what defensemen I'd gamble on to build a team around who are under 25, he'd be in my top 5-10 and because I think defensemen are a lot more valuable than wingers I'd have a few more defensemen in my top 25 than this list does and less wingers.
Like this list should have Hanifin as well! Hanifin, Ristolainen and Lindholm would all make my top 25 of under-25 players to build around. Axe Domi and Saad for sure.