He is being played out of position (wing vs center) and not playing with talented offensive players. Hitchcock keeps putting him on Hanzal's (who isn't producing ****) wing or putting him with players like Ellie and Ritchie. He has great chemistry with Janmark and doesn't get to play with him nor has he played with Benn, Seguin, or Radulov.
Something like
Benn-Seguin-****
Janmark-Spezza-Radulov
would make sense. Yet we see Benn-Seguin-Radulov together and the second (or third) line looking like this...
Ellie-Hanzal-Spezza
Roussel-Spezza-Ritchie
Roussel-Spezza-Ellie
Janmark-Dickinson-Spezza
That and he is averaging 13 minutes a game. He isn't being utilized properly and very likely excel anywhere Dallas trades him.
Yeah. Spezza + Hitch seemed like pretty doomed proposition from the start.
It seems more likely to me that it's just a really bad fit and terrible utilization of his skillset...rather than Spezza just completely forgetting how to produce points over the summer. He is getting older and has been slowing down, but his game has never really been built around that and he was still just fine last year.
But he's always been a natural Center and it's pretty key to the way he generates a lot of his offense - playing him on the Wing is a fail. He also needs linemates who can think the game offensively well enough to keep up with his "creativity" and get to where he needs them to be for setups and give 'n goes, etc. And he needs to be on a top PP unit with lots of man advantage time, because that's one of his strong points as a player (especially now). Give him none of that, and it's not surprising he hasn't produced many points this year.
He'd be a good fit for what Montreal seem to be lacking right now. But unless something has changed, i doubt he has any interest in playing in a Canadian market again...
especially not one of the two craziest hockey hotbeds on a team off to a rough start. Plus, it seems there may end up being some dissonance between what Dallas Management want to do, and what Hitchcock wants to do, and they may not actually want to trade him. That's not a new phenomena.