There's no question it was a bad year. Linemates, lack of powerplay time, bad luck... lots of factors but in the end he didn't get it done in the regular season at all production-wise.
His playoff performance gives us reason for optimism, but for him to produce at a level similar to Draisaitl or Pastrnak would require a stunning amount of development. Honestly not sure what my expectations are for him anymore.
Draisaitl: 18:53 avg TOI / 2:54 avg pp TOI / 172 shots / 16.9% Shooting pct / 27 PP points
Pastrnak: 17:58 / 2:37 / 262 / 13.0% / 24
Ehlers: 17:29 / 2:36 / 204 / 12.3% / 12
Arvidsson: 17:09 / 1:59 / 246 / 12.6% / 9
Nylander: 16:00 / 2:21 / 205 / 10.7% / 26
Reinhart: 17:13 / 2:55 / 178 / 9.6% / 17
Bennett: 14:59 / 1:14 / 122 / 10.7% / 4
He plays the least out of all those players and I think that he is the only one who primarily plays center. On the Flames that means he is stuck behind Backlund and Monahan playing third line minutes and with third line players. That hurts the production, especially compared to guys like Draisaitl, Pastrnak, Ehlers, Arvidsson, and Nylander who all play on the first line.
It looks like he did have some bad luck in the sense that his PDO or Save Percentage + Shooting Percentage number is way down at .967.
Overall, while opportunity is probably more limited for him given his situation on the Flames, he has also been unable to play his way up the line up. Not sure that next year will be all that different.
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