Got them back, though we don’t have individual charts yet, and may just go without them. For now, this is a step up.
Game #68 Preview Suite
Notes: There’s little reason to think they’ll change from a winning lineup from Thursday, such as it was. Hayden will barely play so Saad and Toews will just rotate wingers. We’d actually like to see what Sikura could do there for a game or two…Perlini was a nice add for the Otter Boys. He gives them more speed to open up space, though not nearly the defensive responsibility that Kahun provided. Whatever, anything’s worth trying these days…Has Colliton given up on Forsling? He should, and he’s been out for a couple…Power play has gone stale, as teams are on to the entry now and Hawks aren’t getting as much movement, should try and change it up soon…
Notes: Faksa could return to the lineup tonight, and would likely replace Nichushkin and slot Ritchie down to the 4th line…Radulov had a hat trick in their last game, and lit up the Hawks for three points the last time they met…Bishop has given up one goal in his last three appearances, so it’ll be a task to solve him enough…Seguin has one goal in his last seven…Lindell and Heiskanen have swapped spots, and Klingberg and Heiskanen have really clobbered the opposition together, though they start every shift in the offensive zone…
Game #68 Preview Suite
First Screen Viewing
Jets vs. Hurricanes/Hurricanes vs. Predators – Friday, 6:30/Saturday, 7pm
Gonna give you a twofer here, and mostly because of this blog’s undying love for the Canes. They will get a big say on the Central race this weekend, as well as possibly vaulting themselves into the Metro title discussion or plunging deep into the wildcard muck. As for right now, the Canes are holding the first wildcard spot (known as “Won’t Get Fustigated By Tampa Spot”), but are only two points up on Columbus for the first-loser spot. They’re only six points behind the Islanders with a game in hand, and a win would propel them ahead of the Penguins. Meanwhile, the Jets and Preds discussion hasn’t died out yet. Nashville is up one point but have played three games more, and you have to think the Jets are going to get their act together at some point. But mostly, it’s two of the best teams in the league, both playing what is metrically the best team at even-strength in the league. If the Canes haven’t had a coming out party yet, then this could be it. Or it could shatter our illusions and it’ll be back to the dim candlelight and Emma Ruth Rundle songs for me.
Second Screen Viewing
Penguins vs. Blue Jackets – Saturday, 6pm
I know, I just said this. But they’re having a home-and-home, and the Jackets entire future could be in the balance. They were shutout last night by the Confluence, and another loss in regulation would leave the Jackets six points adrift with only 14 to go of Pittsburgh. Basically meaning there would be only two teams they could catch, and that’s if the Canes don’t get silly and take some points off the Central’s aristocracy at the same time. So you’d think they’d be pretty desperate, the Ohio faithful will be bouncing, and this one will look and feel like a genuine playoff game.
Other Games
Friday
Wild vs. Panthers – 6pm
Devils vs. Capitals – 6pm
Canadiens vs. Ducks – 9pm
Saturday
Sabres vs. Avalanche – 2pm
Blues vs. Sharks – 3pm
Leafs vs. Oilers – 6pm
Senators vs. Bruins – 6pm
Red Wings vs. Lightning – 6pm
Flyers vs. Islanders – 6pm
Devils vs. Rangers – 6pm
Kings vs. Coyotes – 7pm
Knights vs. Canucks – 9pm
Sunday
Red Wings vs. Panthers – 4pm
Jets vs. Capitals – 6pm
Bruins vs. Penguins – 6:30
Knights vs. Flames – 8:30
Kings vs. Ducks – 9pm
I guess it’s because NHL writers love the thought of going to Vegas on the company dime in the spring so much that no one ever bothers to question what George McPhee is doing. It’s kind of the same thing with Nashville, but to an even greater degree. And yet, if you look underneath the hood that NHL media is so happy to just settle for, you’ll see that this is one of the dumber contracts around and that in less than two seasons, George McPhee has completely throat-fucked a completely blank salary cap situation. That’s not easy to do!
So let’s go one at a time. While it hasn’t been made official, it was reported as soon as Stone was traded that he will ink an eight-year, $9.5M per extension with the Knights. Mark Stone is a fine player. Better than that, he’s a good player. Probably the highest-end second-line player you can find. Can even fill out your top line as he had to do in Ottawa for most of his career. All well and good.
Mark Stone has never scored more than 30 goals, and he’s likely to just barely scratch it this year for the first time. In a season when a bunch more are scoring 30 goals. Mark Stone has never bested 64 points, though he might, might get to 70 this year. But he’s never been anywhere near a point-per-game.
I suppose the arguments would be that Mark Stone’s metrics have been other-worldly, especially this season. and especially considering the team he’s been on. And I guess if you want to make the argument that those metrics on a team with better talent like Vegas will result in the numbers that would make $9.5M seem a good deal. It would also make Stone the first “analytic” contract in the sport’s history, and you’ll have to pardon me if I don’t think George “Punchy” McPhee is capable of that. Just a hunch.
Here’s just a smattering of forwards that Stone’s cap hit will be higher than: Sidney Crosby, Leon Draisaitl, Steven Stamkos, Claude Giroux, Vladimir Tarasenko. Yes, grated, those players signed deals at different points in their careers or in different times. But you also would take any of them over Stone in a heartbeat.
Now, you may say that it’s the Knights, it’s an expansion team, and they can overpay guys. Here’s the thing, they can’t! For next year, the Knights have about $10M in space and that’s without an extension for William Karlsson, supposedly their #1 center. While he’s not shooting 25% anymore, he’s also their third-leading scorer, and on their top line, and you’d have to figure he’s going to gobble up at least 60% of that $10M in space. Fuck, if Stone gets $9.5M then why can’t Karlsson ask for that? After all, he actually does have a 30-goal season on his resume.
Depending on what Karlsson cashes in for, the four highest cap hits next year in Vegas will be to players over 30. Because that’s a solid strategy! Works out for everyone! And you may say they can jettison some salary. Except straight salary dumps don’t tend to benefit the team making them and would also erode the depth that the Knights’ success is built on, so I’m told. I guess you could move out Eakin and Tuch for a combined $8M, maybe throw in Colin Miller and Brayden McNabb for another $5.5M, and then sign Erik Karlsson, to give you five contracts to players over 30 that are your highest. Maybe that works for a season, maybe even two, and then what. And what does it matter if Marc-Andre Fleury suddenly starts playing like he’s 35 (which he kind of already is, unless you want to believe that three March games–two of which came against the Ducks and Canucks–undue his .892 February)? Now you’d have no third line or second pairing or goalie. The Sharks have Karlsson, four lines, three pairings, but because of their goaltending might be a second-round washout. So you’re going to do it with less but better than the Sharks next year there, McPhee baby?
I feel like I’m taking crazy pills! And hey, maybe they spasm another run in the spring while beating the Sharks and Flames and maybe even on to the Final again and all the writers get what they’re after anyway. Or maybe they get clubbed by San Jose in the first round and then have a top-heavy and old roster next year, with no cap space. In their third season. That’s some trick.
If you didn’t see the news on Wednesday, let me help. And if you just want the summary, I can do that as well. Basically, David Backes went to Bruce Cassidy, they talked, both discovered he’s been a lumbering drainage ditch for a couple seasons now, and tried to figure out where to go from there. What they really discovered is that he has no place in the Bruins lineup, because he’s slow and chrome-handed now–along with his brain being a quarry–so they came up with this “role” of enforcer.
There is a lot to peel off here to get to its rotten and rancid core, but I’ll try. By declaring himself an enforcer, Backes is basically saying he has no place in the league anymore. That’s a role, or “role,” that is quickly phasing out of the game, and essentially giving himself this title is a way to duck being waived or save some esteem with muttonheads (of which there’s a healthy population in Boston, admittedly) instead of just retiring. The Bruins don’t have to scratch their $6M paperweight until the playoffs, which will save them having to answer questions that might make some uncomfortable. They’ll still have to buy him out in the summer, because you can’t have someone making $6M only playing three minutes on the roster. That’s a fourth-line spot a kid could use and be productive with. Backes can’t. Really, it’s about saving face here.
Still, the questions with this are no more comfortable. There is just nothing that lies easy about a team either being ok with, or straight up telling, a player that to stay in the lineup they’re going to have to just fight and cheapshot every shift. It’s a black mark on the game and harkens back to an era the league has been trying to forget for decades and long ago died its deserved, ugly death. On a lower level, the Bruins don’t need this, because there’s no one on the team who needs “protecting.” And if there were, Zdeno Chara is around and available to play at least 15 minutes a night in other capacities, and Chara’s grinning face is the last thing you see before you die, as Deadspin told us. The Bruins may think they’re doing Backes a favor by at least letting him go off into the woods to die with a label that conveys at least some heroism, but really they’re making themselves out to be cruel masters, or at least spineless enablers. Then again, this kind of thing can only happen in Boston and a few other locales.
As for Backes himself, we understand that professional athletes are just a different type, and there’s nothing wrong with hanging on as long as you can. But his grip slipped a while ago, and he isn’t some overgrown gnome with a 7th-grade education at best who had to bludgeon his way through juniors and the AHL just to make an NHL paycheck, because there was simply no other path. He is a former All-Star (no, really), Olympian, and Selke finalist. By the time this contract is up with the Bruins, whether he serves it out in their uniform or not, Backes will have made over $60 million. While he may love it, and he may not conceive of what he would do next (though I would bet the Blues would have him on their television coverage tomorrow), there is simply no call for him to put himself in greater danger and jeopardize what comes next for him. While he may fear the abyss of retirement, he certainly has enough money to take the time and training for whatever he might come up with (and he is already a pilot). He has a young family, and in some ways he frankly owes them better than going out there and putting his face in front of fists on a nightly basis.
A real league would have never let the Bruins or Backes use this kind of language, but this is a league that is still utterly terrified of crossing swords with anyone in the “Cherry Army.” But you can’t see any other place allowing a team and player to announce they’re going to spend the rest of the season/career (could be the same) essentially breaking the rules and partaking in actions the league wants to be done with. Who looks good here?
In the end, Backes won’t be at that great of a risk because of the way the game is played now and the time of year. With games that mean something, rare is the player who is going to put his team’s seeding/playoff chances at risk by engaging in bullshit with Backes. He’ll spend most of his time chirping from the bench, which is what he was always best at anyway.
The end is here for David Backes. There are far better ways to accept that than holding onto some warrior badge that no longer exists.
THE BEST PART WAS WHEN THE BUILDINGS FELL DOWN. Until late in the third, this one had all the appeal of an open-air autopsy in Miami-Dade in July. But with both of these teams out of the running, there was always a chance this would turn into a shootout, and it did, literally and figuratively. In a game whose highlight was the Sharp–Burish Eagleman parody, it’s nice for the outcome not to be in vain. Unless you’re rooting for a tank, in which case, I can’t help you. To the bullets!
– Brendan Perlini had himself a game tonight. Playing alongside DeBrincat and Strome will do that sometimes, but he really took advantage. In just under 11 minutes, he scratched a 58+ CF% and scored the game-tying goal. His 18.67 CF% Rel led all Hawks forwards on the night, and frankly, it wouldn’t have been upsetting to see him get a little bit more time tonight. He’s probably not much more than a 2019 version Kris Versteeg (1.0 or 2.0 is still TBD), but that can be fun sometimes. I liked that Colliton slotted him there tonight.
– Because we can’t have nice things, a nice performance from Perlini on the second line was balanced by John Hayden appearing on the first line because Colliton’s genious brain is a muscle that needs to be flexed, apparently. He might be a nice guy, and he’s got a degree from Yale—which will no doubt be helpful for when he commits securities fraud after he retires, or whatever it is rich prep boys do in their free time—but he’s not a hockey player for this generation. In just over six minutes, he had a 4 CF against an 11 CA, good for a team-worst 26.67 CF%. The next worst was Patrick Kane, but he also does things like score goals and create assists. Unless you can find someone who either actually commits to GRITHEARTFAAAAAAART or reads Ayn Rand unironically, it’s time to cut bait. He’s just not very good.
– If the Hawks had managed not to play jump rope with their own dicks and win this in regulation, this would have been the ARTEM ANISIMOV GAME. His first goal came on a breakaway (lol) off two excellent tic-tac-toe passes from Kane and Kahun, and the second was sheer power from our widest dicked forward. If he wants to keep Refrigerator Perrying his way into goals, that’d be fine.
– Murphy and Dahlstrom were nails tonight. They dominated the Eichel line to the tune of a 64+and 66+ CF%, respectively. Murphy almost contributed on the score sheet too, with a nice kick to the stick wrister off a Kunitz pass. Connor Murphy probably tops out as a 2A guy on a good team, but when given 1A matchups tonight, be performed admirably.
– Crow was a little urpy tonight. You’d think that he had that first goal caught in his glove, but his fumble, compounded with Seabrook’s Cubist positioning and the delayed penalty, gave Vladimir Fucking Sobotka free rein near the crease. He also totally lost his net on the shorthanded goal unnecessarily. Still, he managed to keep the Hawks within shouting distance, even if that meant taking a hard Sheary wrister right off the mush late in the first. Poor guy can’t catch a break. These games don’t matter much, but seeing how Crow finishes out the year is something to watch. He’s obviously shaking off some rust, but if he can finish strong, it’ll be something to hang onto going into the offseason.
– When Erik Gustafsson is scoring, you can put up with his treasonous dereliction of duty in the defensive zone. When he’s not, it’s worse than watching your mother fuck your bully. He was putrid tonight at all times, falling asleep in coverage on Okposo’s goal being the most obvious. In a perfect world, you pair him with something that looks like a better version of Dahlstrom and let him bum slay, especially if he’s just not going to learn how to play defense. But if he’s not scoring, he’s not worth even the modest salary he’s making now. Something to watch going forward, now that the Hawks don’t have much to play for.
– With each passing day, buying out Seabrook’s contract looks like the only solution to that problem, which is a fucking shame in the grand scheme. He was mostly responsible for Montour’s goal, as he wandered out to the near boards to cover Smith despite Montour and Pominville streaking through the middle of the zone. If he sags back, which is really all he can do anymore anyway, it’s at worst a 2-on-2, with Seabrook covering Montour and Keith covering Pominville, leaving Smith at the point and preventing Montour from taking all that space.
– The power play looked like complete shit. The last thing Coach Cool Youth Pastor needs is for the one thing that he can point to as making better taking a huge dump on him toward the end of the year. It’s only one game, but they looked terribly out of sorts.
– Top Cat had a couple of excellent chances that he just missed on. The most disappointing miss came off Kane’s rebound on the PP, which looked like a guarantee coming off his stick. Instead, the puck rung around the boards to Rodrigues, who blew away a half-assing Kane and led to Bogosian’s highlight reel goal. Shit happens.
– Duncan Keith had a pretty good game. His goal was good, aggressive awareness. His possession numbers were a refurbished marital aid, which is concerning because he didn’t match up with the Eichel line too much. But he wasn’t a complete tire fire. Baby steps.
– Garbage Dick hopped over Larmer for fourth in Hawks history with 924 points on his assist on Keith’s goal. Creep can roll.
If you’re a Brendan Perlini or Artem Anisimov fan, you had a really fun time tonight. And for as stupid as 3-on-3 OT and the shootout are, they’re mindless fun. Which is exactly the kind of fun we need with this team.
Onward . . .
Booze du Jour: High Life and Maker’s 46
Line of the Night: Each team has had the lead in the game! Who’s gonna win it? –Foley
First Screen Viewing
Blue Jackets vs. Penguins – 6pm
Greg Wyshynski made a point the other day, and while I’m loathe to agree with him much, I have to admit I’ve been thinking about it. While it would be utterly hilarious if the Jackets were to plummet out of the playoff picture after their big going-for-it deadline, it would only serve to scare off GMs in the future from being aggressive. And you have to admit, if nothing else, when NHL GMs get aggressive it makes for excellent television. Then again, I also kind of love that Artemi Panarin has two goals in his last eight when they’ve needed him most, as he checks real estate listings for Miami Beach or Manhattan. Anyway, this isn’t make or break for the Jackets, but they currently don’t have a chair and a loss here puts them four points behind the Penguins with only 15 to go. And the Canes aren’t slowing down either, and should the Canadiens put one over the Sharks tonight as well they’ll be four points behind them as well. These two met right around the deadline in Columbus and the Pens thwacked them but good. Should be interesting.
Second Screen Viewing
Avalanche vs. Stars – 7:30
The Avs currently don’t have a chair either, and the Stars hold one of the wild card ones. But the Avs are right on their shoulders, so this one has some spice as well. Then again, the Avs just lost to the Ducks and needed overtime to get past the Wings at home, so they may be wheezing a bit here. The Stars meanwhile have won four of five, including somehow stopping the recent juggernaut of filth that is the St. Louis Blues. Will go a long way to sorting out the West’s picture.
Other Games
Panthers vs. Bruins – 6pm
Islanders vs. Senators – 6:30
Rangers vs. Red Wings – 6:30
Wild vs. Lightning – 6:30
Canucks vs. Oilers – 8pm
Flames vs. Coyotes – 8pm
Blues vs. Kings – 9:30
Canadiens vs. Sharks – 9:30
vs. 
RECORDS: Sabres 30-28-8 Hawks 27-30-9
PUCK DROP: 7:30
TV: NBCSN Chicago
IN A BARREL: Die By The Blade
I’ll give you the perspective as a season ticket holder. Normally, the Sabres game is one you can count on unloading for a profit. It usually doesn’t matter what state the Sabres are in, because Buffalo fans travel (or they’re already here and just come out of whatever abandoned factory they live in). Tonight’s game, I couldn’t sell for a song. Even Sabres fans couldn’t find a fuck to give about this one. That’s partly due to their own team’s slide ever since they won 10 in a row, and the Hawks not being able to be much of a draw to anyone else. The combination of the two renders this one a “non-happening.”
So let’s start with the Hawks, who return from a frankly embarrassing California trip. They needed a buzzer-beater to get past the Ducks, who have been a burned-up clown car for two months or more. They were flattened by the Kings, who had lost 10 in a row before that. Then they were simply outclassed by the Sharks, which isn’t a crime, but not something you can just shrug off when everyone didn’t care against the worst team in the conference the day before.
So now it becomes the watch to see how they respond. The season is lost, and they can say whatever they want. So can Coach Cool Youth Pastor keep his charges interested and motivated? Because he’s coming off a trip where pretty much everyone couldn’t be bothered in Los Angeles. He then had his assistant captain essentially air him out, in a way, to the press. So he’s not in the best spot here, with a team closer to giving him the Bolo Yeung wave-off than anyone in the organ-i-zation should be comfortable with.
So if the Hawks mail it in here for the last 15 games, yes that would probably be better long-term due to the draft position, but it will put Jeremy Colliton in an awfully weird position. Once a team quits on you, it’s nearly impossible to reel them back in. Whatever they may want, Keith is going to be here next year. So will Kane and Toews. You can probably count on motivation from the latter two, either due to sociopathy or professional pride, but even Toews has had his nights off this year. What if he checks out? Then you’re basically lost, and you have a lot of young players in what is becoming a more and more toxic atmosphere.
However, if Colliton can get them to recover and at least spasm one more death rattle, at least there’s hope that those who are gong to take this team forward in the future are listening. Which isn’t much, but it’s at least what I’m paying attention to.
As for on the ice matters, David Kampf returns, in for Dylan Sikura. That’s kind of annoying, but I can’t really defend Sikura too much more when he hasn’t scored. Kampf is actually more important than most realize, as his Baby Kruger ’13 act has been missed. So that’s cool. Corey Crawford gets the chance to recover from his technicolor yawn in Los Angeles.
To the Sabres, who have sunk like a stone since briefly being the talk of the league in the fall. Since that 10-gamer that was all OT and one-goal wins, they’ve gone 13-22-6, which is unsightly to say the least. And there’s not a lot to build on at the moment. They don’t score a bunch, they give up too many goals, but they’re not that close to the bottom in any category. Their summer hinges on whether they can keep Jeff Skinner, as he’s been the only winger to really dovetail with Jack Eichel.
Their big move at the deadline was to move along Brendan Guhle for Brandon Montour–the hallowed Brendan-to-Brandon upgrade–in a bid to get anything on their blue line other than Rasmus The Younger. The rest of the season will also be an evaluation of Phil Housley as coach. If the Sabres continue to break up like a too-steep reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere, he’s going to be out of a job come May. If he can pull them out of this stall, he may get one more chance.
Like a lot of not-quite teams, the Sabres are one line. There’s Skinner-Eichel-Reinhart, and then whatever you find at the bottom of your trash can when you take the bag out. Evan Rodrigues is centering the second line, for god’s sake. Casey Middlestadt carries a lot of hope but not a lot of production yet. Kyle Okposo went back to his home planet. There’s nothing else really worth talking about.
This is one of a few games left on the schedule that will take place merely because they have to. There’s nothing riding on it, so just try and enjoy the spectacle of a hockey game. There’s not much else I can say about it.
Game #67 Preview Suite
Now that the Hawks’ season once again lies in rubble and dust, you wouldn’t blame fans for turning their scarred eyes to the summer, and to the hopes of what the Hawks might do in free agency or via trade. One name you’re going to hear more than once is Jeff Skinner.
The Hawks have been connected to Skinner before, a couple times during his days in Carolina. Skinner was seemingly always on the block, and some of it had to do with a reputation of being a complete dickhead in the dressing room. But this is hockey, so even if that was true, what it’s based on could be literally anything. He might have worn orange New Balance shoes once and Jordan Staal would have lost his shit. We don’t know.
The Hawks couldn’t get much into the Skinner trade talks this past summer, as Skinner made it pretty clear he only wanted to go close to his home of Toronto. Buffalo counts. He didn’t cost all that much, three draft picks in the next two drafts and no first-rounders and also a prospect the Hurricanes have already moved along. He won’t cost any picks in the summer, but he will cost a fair amount of money.
Skinner is a lock to put up his first 40-goal season, to go with two other 30+ goal seasons. And if Mark Stone can get $9.5M a year (seriously that contract is STOOOOPID), and he’s never pierced 30, then Skinner’s and his agent’s eyes must be lighting up. Especially considering Skinner is just 26. Might they be looking at eight figures? That’s hard to justify, especially if you look deeper.
Skinner is an elite sniper, so his metrics are always going to be outdone by his actual performance. Or at least they usually will be. But this season is something of an outlier even in that. Skinner is averaging less shots, less attempts, and less chances than he has in the last five years, and that’s with getting to play with actual talent in Buffalo instead of Raleigh (the Canes never had a center in the stratus of Jack Eichel, until Aho this year). And yet he’s cashing in at 16.3% of his chances at even-strength, which is miles over what he’s done before. It’s also double his expected shooting percentage, based on the chances he’s getting. Again, Skinner is a gifted scorer, and he’ll regularly outshoot his expected percentages, but double? On the plus side, he does always stay on the positive side of the possession count and ahead of his team’s rate. But he’s also been heavily, heavily kept in the offensive zone on his shifts, so he’d better.
There also is an element of, “Yeah, but who gives a shit?” with Skinner. He’s never played a playoff game, won’t this year, and he’s never been all that close. So no team has been good because Skinner is on it. It’s hard for a winger to accomplish that, but it’s something an inquiring team might want to consider, especially if you’re going to hand him Scrooge McDuck’s vault. It could be that Skinner is just something of a luxury player and you’d better have everything else.
Again, 40 goals is 40 goals. But given the spike in his percentages, more likely Skinner tops out as a 30-35 goal guy. And that’s hardly a nothing. But it’s not something you pay more than $7M per year for, and Skinner is likely to be asking for more than that. Buyer beware.
Game #67 Preview Suite
Melissa Burgess has been a longtime contributor to DieByTheBlade.com, a leading Sabres site. You can follow her on Twitter @_MelissaBurgess. This is the Q&A we did with her a month ago when the Hawks were in Buffalo, and things were a bit rosier for all of us.
The Sabres had an incredible hot streak in the fall, but have been pretty poor since. What was going so right then that’s going so wrong now?
They did have an incredible hot streak, but it was a lucky one. So many of those wins came by one goal, whether in OT or shootout or regulation – it’s not like they were exactly running away with games. They just happened to find ways to win every night, grabbing the dirty goals, sometimes in the final minutes, and never giving up. So what’s changed? I think they just stopped meshing in that same way and it shows. Production drops off, pairings and lines don’t mesh the same, and all of a sudden, you find yourself out of the playoff picture.
What’s been the review of #1 overall pick Rasmus Dahlin?
Dahlin has been doing well so far in his rookie season. I think it’s important always for people to remember that he’s going to make mistakes, as any player is. But for Dahlin, it’s not just what he’s doing this season or what he does next season that matters; he’s hopefully a part of this team long-term and that success matters too. I think he’s a promising young defenseman and I like what I see from him.
Jeff Skinner is pouring in the goals but has yet to sign an extension. What’s the buzz on the chances of his long term stay?
It seems more likely than not that Skinner stays in Buffalo. I mean, when’s the last time you saw him without a smile on his face? In all seriousness, I’ve heard contract talks will start soon and I’m super excited for that. He’s an unreal player and it’s a treat to have him.
Jack Eichel is on his way to blowing past his career high in points. What’s the feeling about him there? Being drafted alongside Connor McDavid doesn’t help, but it doesn’t feel like he’s usually considered in the “next crop” of superstars like McDavid, Matthews, Petterssen, and the like…
I’ve never thought about it like that, but that’s true. You see everyone talking about the others, but not Eichel so much. I think he’s a quiet producer – lots of assists but also lots of moves that maybe seem small and don’t result in points – and that makes him lower on people’s radar. Of course, McDavid has always been “The Next One” and Matthews being in Toronto, there’s a lot of hype there. But I think just the fact that Eichel is that quieter leader sometimes leaves him off people’s radar. I think he’s been a great fit for this team, he seems genuinely invested in the present and the future.
Game #67 Preview Suite
