Quote:
Originally Posted by Camronius
I dunno, I saw a few comments in the game threads suggesting both Bart and Brouwer had good games. Did no one else notice that every time we were hemmed in, or there was a chance against, it was the 4th line and the 3rd defensive pairing. I get that, that's effectively our "worst" 5-man unit... but it doesn't really change that they were on for almost every chance against.
Maybe that's more of a coaching issue, that that unit is out there together so much....I don't know. I just can't agree that they had good games. They made desperate exciting plays because they had to, they either turned it over, lost position or otherwise that made for these thrilling spontaneous plays... I wouldn't call that a good game. Hamonic had a GOOD game, he quietly and effectively shut down people all night and didn't cause me to choke on my heart... (same goes for Smith).
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For the stat test.
http://hockeystats.ca/game/2017020038
Well Stajan had the second highest 5 on 5 corsi on the team. Brouwer had the 5th highest corsi among forwards. Bartkowski had the 3rd highest corsi on the defense. Kind of suggests what you noticed what biased. Humans often make very biased observations. It's hard to watch a game from a neutral perspective and notice everything equally. If you're watching for the 4th line to be hemmed in you'll notice that. If you're expecting the 1st line to do well offensively you might not take note of whole shifts they have where they struggle to get established in the offensive zone.
That said as far as my eye test went I personally thought Bartkowski did have a surprisingly good game. I didn't see him turn the puck over much. I thought he moved the puck well and defended well. He deserved the praise, he played his minor role quite well. Those people who praised him noticed him playing well. And likely they aren't huge Bartkowski fans because not many people here are.
Basically when people say Bartkowski had a good night its probably because he did. Because the prevailing bias on this board is to think he sucks. Same goes for Brouwer. I wouldn't say Brouwer was strong but he doesn't look out of place on the 4th line whereas he did further up the lineup.