You're still letting his contract cloud your view of what you are talking about. I don't know why you brought up Silfverberg, Kase, and Henrique..I never claimed Perry to be better than any of them.
Just because I mention his contract doesn't mean that it's clouding my judgement. I figured it was relevant considering that a large part of the flack Perry receives is due to what we expect out of him, and what we expect out of his contract. It has nothing to do with his skill level in a vacuum but it's hardly a non sequitur.
Silfverberg, Kase, and Henrique are relevant as they illustrate how stupid evaluating on pure points is. Out of the 3 players I listed, only Kase is on a higher point pace than Perry. Henrique is on pace for 46 points over an 82 game season. Silfverberg is on pace for 43. Perry being a "50 point" forward means nothing.
In no way are the points "empty". His goals and assists count the same on the scoreboard as Rakell's and Getzlaf's do. It might be his only skill but it's a skill that at least 5 forwards on this team don't have (Ritchie, Wagner, Vermette, Brown, Cogs)
5 forwards is hardly an insulator between Perry and the bottom 6. He's behind at least 5 forwards (Getzlaf, Rakell, Silfverberg, Kase, and Henrique) in terms of offensive talent, and Kesler has a very solid case for being #6 on that list when he's healthy. That makes Perry our seventh best forward, even when you eliminate the defensive side of the game (in which Cogliano begins to make a case himself) and we're talking about a team that doesn't have a true star up front, save for Getzlaf. He's 3rd on the RW depth chart. Once again, this isn't an offensively stacked team -- a guy like Kase who is arguably our best RW would be 2nd on almost all the teams in the league and even 3rd on a few. Perry just doesn't stack up.
Also I still see Perry going to the net as much as anyone on the team, something some of the forwards on this team are allergic to.
Points for effort aren't good enough. He doesn't create havoc around there nearly as well as he used to. His deflections are decaying and his hands around the net -- historically one of his best assets -- are pretty mediocre now.
I agree his defensive play is a joke I've never said differently
Once again, I'm talking about the worthlessness of points in evaluating a player. Take into account defensive ability and Perry is a 3rd liner on a team with little star power.
The contract is a sunk cost, there's nothing Perry or the team can do about it, short of a buyout or retirement, which isn't even worth talking about given what he's meant to the franchise
I'm not suggesting that. Perry should retire here, and on his own terms. Him and Getzlaf have both been huge parts of our franchise for over a decade and it would be despicable to cast them aside when they've really begun hitting a serious decline.
All I'm saying is that Perry is overall not a top 6 forward at this point, and shouldn't be discussed as such just because he's on the vaunted "50-point pace".
