His work ethic must have fallen off once he made his millions. Because early on he seemed like one of those hardworking buzzsaws who might not be naturally gifted offensively, but could play on a scoring line because he's skilled *enough* to go along with a non-stop motor.
Nah he's still is a hard worker with decent hands and good speed but on the cycle he's not very good as he gets bumped off pucks too easy and doesn't have quality vision, creativity and even positional smarts. His shot is more of a checker than goal scorer and he's nothing special in his own end of the ice. He simply hasn't been very good in an elevated role this season and even last after 15 games or so with reasonable expectation.
Hoglander has been much more effective all season and was pushing him down to redundant
Ideally he's a 1.5-2.5 million dollar energy guy that fits 6-9 on your roster and when on a hot streak could jump into a forechecker role with a top6 line. Most teams 3rd lines are looking for some heaviness so there are not a ton of value positions for him to play to get the most from him and not have the team suffer.
On a team like Chicago with lots of offensive situations and without too much expectation to win he could score like a top6 and fool some team this off season to overvaluing what he is but for Vancouver moving his heavy contract and 4th line role and improving the D with Zadorov that was some outstanding maneuvering
