Mrb1p
PRICERSTOPDAPUCK
Well for the 70ish games I've seen.Maybe it's a question of perception because while all of this may or may not be true (you really tracked his every mistake? My gosh lol).
I know exactly what type of Dman he is, he's risky and he's going to force the issue at times and turn the puck over as a result.
I have never, ever thought of him as Scott Niedermayer...so i'm perfectly fine given the context of this team that's he's mostly there, purely for his offense.
His limited offensive IQ is also costing offense. It's easy to take it at face value and just say "hes good offensively" because his production is honestly amazing.
It's important to look at the context or his production though. The highest minutes in the league in soft minutes (6v5, 5v4, 5v3, 3v3 and 4v4), stapled to the first PP with the good players, stapled to every single offensive units, very little is asked of him defensively, etc.
You can take it at face value but you can also realize that there's very little examples of this type of deployment for successful teams. The only one I can think of is Carlson in Washington.
If he is a stop gap, he's pretty much wasted value because you know someone will overpay for him and if he is not then we're not going anywhere unless he's on the third pair in an exploitation role.
Matheson is a fine player in a vacuum and most of the gripe I have with him are the same I had with Desharnais and Danault. The moment you have to sacrifice team success for a players success, you're in a territory that cannot be conducive to winning. The moment Suzuki came in and slid Danault down to 2 and a half C, the team started winning more and he started scoring less.
There's some players that do it very well. Savard is one, and there is sure value in that. I'm entirely sure Matheson doesn't really do it. He doesn't talk to anyone on the bench or on the ice, he's just there. Savard can be seen barking all over. Sometimes it can be a lot more subtle like Marky with Subban but it is still there.Yeah i'm not sure about the mentorship angle either, I think most players actually don't want to be mentors if anything. But for me it's more about his value as a contributor on this team, he does jumpstart a lot of our offense and again, although he's no defensive stalwart, his skating enables him to cover a lot of ground defensively.
To me there's a lot of value in that for the continued development of the players we currently have. I don't think there's anyone on the roster right now whose capable of doing what he does on the ice at this stage of their careers.
Of course, you hope one day Hutson/Mailloux/Reinbacher can bring some of the elements that Matheson has but in a more "holistic" way, but what are you telling Suzuki, Caufield, Slaf, Dach, Newhook and any other player this team is building, by taking away one of it's prime offensive weapons?
To me it's just what he brings and what he does, has a certain value...and that value is very high. So when I read that someone would trade him for a mid round 1st round pick, it's a head scratcher to me.
And I wouldn't call myself a "fan" per se, like you, I think there's some holes in his game but I do think he's gotten much better as a complete player. The player I thought we were acquiring when we traded for him and the player he is today (at least IMO) is totally different.
So again, i'm not opposed to trading him...I just think he's worth more than what's being tossed around here. There aren't a lot of dmen in the NHL who can skate and do the things he does offensively (not withstanding his defensive lapses).
I think it's normal that guys who produce offensively, tend to get more rope. But that's probably got more to do with Matheson's standing as a veteran more than anything.