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Originally Posted by Bingo
I think this is the classic case of the middle is the rule ...
Monahan isn't a true number one center, but to suggest Craig Conroy was a better center is pretty unfair. Langkow has an argument for sure.
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Better overall hockey player. Conroy was a 50+ point center who was better defensively than Backlund or at least just as good. His career high was 75 points I think or around there. Monahan is a 60+ point center who is clueless defensively and has an 82 point career season. Monahan is also not as good of a playmaker as Conroy but maybe we would see that side of Monahan's game more if he was forced into a playmaking role if Gaudreau was removed. Im not sure who he would set up exactly but we would see.
I think that if a player is going to ignore 50% of the ice, he better be 50% more productive to compensate. All I'm seeing with Monahan is a guy floating around, sponging up most of his points thanks to Gaudreau and he honestly doesn't do much else. The fact that he doesn't play to his size doesn't help either. Langkow did way more with his 5'11" frame than Monahan does with his 6'3". Conroy wasn't a physical beast by any stretch but he wasn't invisible like Monahan either, playing like he's scared half the time
Make Lindholm Gaudreau's center and move Tkachuk to RW and you probably have a top 5-10 line in hockey. Unfortunately we only have 2 complete hockey players in our top 6 so Ward does what he can with what he has. Pretty much forced into playing Monahan with Gaudreau because he would probably be a 45 point no defense center without him and that is... basically useless.