Quote:
Originally Posted by timbit
Johnny is an excellent player. For the team to win consistently, he has to produce consistently.
The Flames are not a gifted offensive team.
|
Production does not exist in a vacuum.
Let's look at our old friend Sam Bennett
Mis-used as a grinding winger with spotty minutes, he was an inconsistent scorer here.
Properly used as an 18-minute-a-night all-situations play-driving centre, with a playmaking winger, he has been a consistent scorer in Florida.
Even though he brought an element to the centre ice position that no centre Gaudreau has ever played with brought - skill, speed, and creativity through the middle of the ice:
The Flames never thought to pair these two together (at the correct positions) for an extended period, for reasons that still baffle me.
Instead they have, for seven years, kept Gaudreau glued to centres who are consistently so late in joining the rush that... there is no rush at all.
Nikita Kucherov has arguably been one of the most productive wingers in the world in a loooong time. But look at the kind of support he gets from Point:
Can you even remember the last time Gaudreau's centre did something like that? I'm not talking about Point's hands here, but the ability to create the play in transition with his speed and hustle when Kucherov had NOTHING.
I cannot. I can remember his defensemen... Russell... Giordano... Hamilton... Brodie.. Kylington... Hanifin doing that. Guys like Lindholm and Monahan... they'd still be at the red line when Gaudreau is doing the same move Kucherov does here.
Our centres have always let Gaudreau down in transition, and he gets the blame for it every time he stops up in his zone while outnumbered.
We're at a point where it's time to finally give Gaudreau a centre like Backlund or Dube. It doesn't
need to be the highest scoring centre on the team. They don't need to be joined at the hip for
every shift either.
But Gaudreau deserves more than just cycle cycle cycle in congested offensive zones. He's not Daniel Sedin.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Classic_Sniper
I actually think along the same lines. Backlund at his very best, looks like an elite 2 way center. He probably has the most tools out of all the centers on this team, the problem though is his range, we could see his ”A” game just as often as we can see his “D” game.
Lindholm on the other hand, may not have as many tools as Backlund possesses as a center, but we basically see Lindholm’s “A” & “B” game every game. He’s extremely consistent and you can rely on him to do good work on both ends of the ice all the time.
|
I don't think we see Lindholm's B game all that often. He masks a lot of awful nights with a powerplay point here or there, or tap-ins created by the best forward on the Flames.