Maybe we don't need to exclude them, but we can acknowledge the "new team high" effect. A guy being traded, as a ton of raw energy, wants to make a good impression...those extra bundles of nerves tend to add wings to your skates for a little while. Kinda like how a lot of rookies look good in preseason or the first few games of the regular season, before reality sets in.
Ok, that explains his first game where he got 2 points, it's probably a stretch to explain his 3rd game, where he got 2 pts, but that's a colossal stretch to explain his 6th game with the team being a 2 pts game.
Having said that, do we consider that he came to a new team and had to build chemistry with new teammates may have caused him to look out of place? Or maybe learning Boucher's system, which we all know took some time for the team to figure out, may have made him look out of place?
Nobody is expecting the 45 pts pace he had in his 20 reg season games as a Sen or even his 37 pts pace he had reg season playoff combined as a Sen, what some of us are saying is he's not a 4th line plug, and there's no indication that he's overpaid as a 3rd liner at 2.5 mil. He played 90 games this season all combined (Van, Ott and playoffs), and had a 33 pts pace per 82 during those 90 games, so why are people acting as though we should only expect 20-25 based on a small 20 game sample where we exclude his better games but include all his worst? Every play has ups and downs, and will look significantly worse if you exclude the highs.
People are quick to call him a bottom 6 forward, but I fully expect he'll be used as more of a middle 6 guy, playing on any of the top three lines, which frankly should make sense to most around here given that Hoffman was mostly used on the 3rd line; Boucher likes to spread things out and mix and match.
I would have liked it if we had kept Methot, or found a stop gap replacement until we knew Chabot was ready, but aside from that, I'm pretty happy with what the team looks like going into this season. With MacArthur back, and no growing pains implementing a new defensive system, I think we'll have a much better start to the year. I expect that somebody on the coaching staff's summer job will be devising a functional PP system, and they'll actually have time to implement it in the preseason this year. I'm also hopeful that Brassard and Ryan will have bounce back years offensively. (Ryan should have his armoured gloves this season, so here's hoping no more broken fingers! and both he and Brassard out-produced there regular season paces in the playoffs)
I think we have a ton of depth up front;
- Hoffman, MacArthur, Smith, and Dzingel have all shown they can handle top 6 LW duties, Burrows can slide into that role in a pinch too.
-Turris, Brassard make a good one-two punch, and Pageau is an excellent 3rd line center that can handle 2nd line center duties if needed. Thompson from the reviews in Anahiem is a great 4th line center that had injury issues. Could be a center version of Pyatt for us.
- Stone and Ryan make for a pretty solid top 6 RW combo, Burrows is more than adequate as a 3rd RW option. White could be knocking at the door as well and Dzingel can flip sides and play 3rd line RW when needed. Pyatt also showed some chemistry with Pageau as a shutdown line.
-Dzingel, Thompson, Pyatt, Paul and White will fight out for that 4th line, a mix of defensive vets, and promising youth, some of which have the capacity to step up into bigger roles.
Going into this season, unlike last year, we not only have good depth when healthy, but we have guys that can step into bigger roles playing on lower lines should we lose a top guy to injury, and extra bodies that can step in when needed for the bottom 6. No need to call up the likes of Blunden or Varone, and hope they can handle it, instead, we have White or Dzingel as our 13th forward, maybe Paul if he maintains his play from the dev camp.
The only downside is Brassard and Karlsson's surgery; hopefully both are ready to go by the start of the season, or early on in it, and don't suffer too much aftereffects. We need both guys going on all cylinders.
I won't get into the backend, we have 8 or 9 guys that can play at this level imo, but some uncertainty as to who can handle filling Methot's role.