Kent Wilson with a good article about Bennett at the Athletic today. Some interesting stats and charts as usual from Kent. My takeaway from his article is that Sam is exactly what most are saying here - a bottom 6 player. Perhaps a
very good bottom 6 player but not more. When playing with Bennett, guys like Jankowski, Czarnik, Neal and Ryan saw an increase to their possession numbers. On the flip side, Gaudreau, Tkachuk, Monahan and Lindholm all saw their CF% drop and in Monahan and Gaudreau's case, it dropped significantly. Smaller sample size, though.
This is not to say that Bennett can't fill in on the top lines when needed but in terms of where he looks to fit the best, where he can actually drive the play, I'd say he should probably live on the 3rd line with spot duty on other lines as required.
https://theathletic.com/984048/2019/...the-next-step/