Quote:
Originally Posted by GordonBlue
you must not have paid attention to how Draisaitl's careers started.
he played 37 games at 12 minutes a game, was -17 and sent back to junior. Mcdavid wasn't even in the league yet.
I don't know who he played the most with in his second year. not sure where to look that up.
he was being mismanaged and then sent back to junior after 37 games. go back in calgary puck history. oilers were laughed at about Draisaitl by pretty well everyone on how he was managed and that at how his skating was not NHL level.
you can say it was probably for the best he was sent back to junior. that could be a big difference in his development compared to Bennett.
that and the fact Draisaitl worked his butt off in junior instead of pouting and also worked his butt off to correct deficiencies in his game, like his skating.
Draisaitl at this moment is more the result of a talented player working harder than anyone else to maximise that talent over team development. have you seen how oilers develop players?
Heck this year he's been a far better player than McDavid and in fact could be said to be carrying him.
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In their 18yo seasons, when Bennett went down to Jrs, he put up 24 points in 11 games after rehabbing his shoulder all year, so it's not like he was slacking.
In their 19yo seasons, Draisaitl played 80+% of his ice time with Taylor Hall. Bennett played about 30% of his time with Mikael Backlund, and the Bennett-Backlund pair produced at a higher rate than the Draisaitl-Hall pair. The rest of his ice time was a random assortment of bottom-6ers.
In their 20yo seasons, Draisaitl played half of his time with McDavid. When together, they produced a lot. Away from McDavid, Draisaitl got his teeth kicked in. Away from Draisaitl, McDavid was even better. Bennett played about 40% of his ice time with Brouwer and another 40% with Chiasson. Bennett's numbers were overall better than Draisaitl away from McDavid.
In their 21yo seasons, Draisaitl was even worse away from McDavid, but even better with him. By this point, Bennett's numbers are really declining and he's pretty negative across the board.
Last year, Draisaitl had his worst season yet away from McDavid (36% GF), but was again very good with him. By this point, Bennett has sort of reinvented himself as a bottom-6 grinder and his possession stats have rebounded but he's pretty much what he is today.
And even this year, Draisaitl still plays about 90% of his ice time with McDavid. And Bennett is still a grinder with solid possession numbers but not much offense to speak of.
After their first two seasons, there was a very legitimate case that Bennett was the better player, and the difference in point totals was purely due to ice time and linemates. And still, to this day, Draisaitl hasn't ever been a positive player away from McDavid outside of a single playoff run with a 115 (!) PDO.
So no, I disagree with this idea that you can ascribe 100% of a player's success to his own hard work and talent, and it's just a coincidence that the one that succeeded just happened to have
the best player of the last 10 years on his line. You obviously can't just throw any old plug there and turn them into a 50-goal scorer, but when you have a highly talented but raw young player, opportunity makes a massive, massive difference.