Ethan Bear had less defensive blunders than Bouchard. By a country mile too, it’s not even close.
There is a difference between flawless and a shitshow. The first 10 games of the season were such. I like Bouchard, just not blind to the blips in his game. Players get beat, we saw Slavin and Pesce get beat. I am generally not a fan of mistakes caused by effort and bad reads. Certainly he and the rest of the team are playing better now, but excellence as you said he was, requires him to be great on both sides of the puck and I hope the improvement continues.
Ethan Bear is a strange comparison. Bear was amazing for most of a season and then... Just fell apart. The good bear was impressive and worth keeping around. The bad Bear was AHL fodder. I didnt like trading Bear away but by the same token he was trending towards complete bust and... is he still even playing in the NHL?
Terrible comparison.
Bouchard will always have defensive warts. That isnt an excuse for a brutal start to the season. I hope I never see that many bad plays from one player period ever again in my lifetime. Just bad. When that bad he does not offset his bad plays verse his good offense.
However, like most the Oilers he turned the corner, 24 points in 23 games as young as he is plus a return to "normal" defensively is incredible. The last 10+ games he has been awesome and easily out scoring his defensive lapses most games.
He is so far from his peak. If he improves defensively and offensively within reasonable expectation... That would be incredible.