Quote:
Originally Posted by gvitaly
IMO Lindholm wasn't playing at the same level defensively that he played on the Gaudreau - Tkachuk line. Backlund still gets the toughest matchups.
Here's the xGA/60 of lines that played more than 100mins for the Flames
Huberdeau - Lindholm - Sharangovich 3.17
Mangiapane - Lindholm - Sharangovich 2.71
Compared to
Zary - Kadri - Pospisil xGA/60 1.86
Mangiapane - Backlund - Coleman 2.39
Huberdeau - Backlund - Coleman 2.56
Now I'm not saying Lindholm is bad defensively, but his defensive impact gets slightly overblown. Is he better than Kuzmenko defensively? Most likely. That said there's a good chance we won't notice the difference especially if Kuzmenko is producing.
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No major argument from me ... he wasn't playing all that well ... but then nobody really has defensively this year.
But it's pretty hard to rationalize taking Lindholm out of the 1C spot and replacing him with a winger that is known to be somewhat suspect defensively, and losing one of your two key PK forwards doesn't downgrade your hockey team.