Quote:
Originally Posted by CsInMyBlood
Except you know you went through and cherry picked Monahans "ok" shifts. You are a huge Monahan fan. You could more easily also go and cherry pick Gaudreaus good plays but you wont because you are continually blaming Johnny for Monahans horribad hockey.
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I'm a big Monahan fan, but also a big Gaudreau fan. Maybe I'm biased lately because of my frustrations with Gaudreau's play in the playoffs. However my analysis was based on what I've seen, yes. I haven't seen Gaudreau outwork the Stars to put his teammates into good situations in the same way that Monahan has, even if that has been painfully subpar as well. Gaudreau's "good rushes" that have been talked about during the games usually consist of him skating through the neutral zone nicely, but ultimately turning it over.
I flat out said Monahan has been a disappointment, I'm just more willing to forgive a player that seems to be doing a lot of the small things right at both ends of the ice compared to someone who hasn't really been able to do much right at either end of the ice 5v5. Gaudreau had the one nice pass to set Monahan up in Game 4, and Monahan returned the favour with that 2 on 1 play as well as the one-timer from the slot in OT. Are there some prime examples of Gaudreau creating offense you can recall from these games? I'll pull them.
Either way, my point was that I don't think the 2 players work as a pairing in the playoffs based on the games we've seen. Gaudreau isn't the same player in tight checking playoff hockey, so he can't get the puck to Monahan consistently the same way, and Monahan isn't the right type of centre for Gaudreau in the playoffs either obviously.