Brian39
Registered User
- Apr 24, 2014
- 7,220
- 13,271
Hard disagree about Mikkola. He excelled in that role for a while, but he absolutely didn't sustain it. He was a +3 over 27 games in the stretch of games you are describing where he was playing 19+ a night. That is the absolute high point of his season and he was a -9 the rest of the year. Scandella returned from injury in March and promptly took those minutes back from Mikkola. He went +14 the rest of the way (25 games), playing 19:19 a night.I diagree. I think Mikkola was better. Not by a ton, but he was better. Our defense really settled down when Mikkola started getting the tough minutes rather than Scandella. We also were talking with Leddy the whole time, so we had a pretty decent idea of what it would take to sign him. So that lessened the gamble. As is, we gambled by not moving Scandella as well. We lost Perron as a result, as it is rumored he is signing in Detroit.
Neither have good possession stats and both get very defensive usage. Scandella is a +35 over his 130 games as a Blue averaging 19 minutes a night. Mikkola is a -14 over his 89 games as a Blue averaging 16 minutes a night. Just looking at last year, Scandella had resoundingly better outcomes than Mikkola with more minutes.
"We lost Perron by not moving Scandella before free agency" is nothing but a narrative. There is zero evidence or reporting about Scandella's value (positive or negative). There's zero support for the notion that we couldn't have signed Perron and then freed up cap space. Blaming the loss of Perron on choosing not to move Scandella a week ago is a massive leap in logic.