Foppa2118
Registered User
- Oct 3, 2003
- 52,387
- 31,649
I mean come on. He's consistently played great pretty much all year and nobody bumped this thread. He has a few shifts over a few games that weren't good and now we bump this thread to be negative about him?
This is why the "EJ's a bottom pairing defenseman falling off a cliff" false narrative took hold so easily years ago. Same with how everyone remembered how good he was in the playoffs a few seasons ago, and then when he missed games to injury, nearly everyone forgot and went back to the old narrative. Why do we cherry pick his bad moments so often and take for granted all his good moments? Especially when the good moments far out weigh the bad ones. It's like 95/5.
And it's just flat out objectively false to say that injuries have taken away his speed and ability to win battles. I don't even know how AJ could come to that conclusion after watching him all year. That's as bad as AJ Mleczko repeatedly saying the Avs are heavy up the middle, because she doesn't really pay attention to the Avs. EJ's literally skating better than he has in years, doing a bunch of Girard like spino-rama's, and he's won a shit ton of battles in the D zone. By far the most on the team.
I swear nobody really watches EJ play defense or watches defenseman defend in general. They just watch the puck carrier. It's the same reason people thought Barrie had taken leaps and bounds defensively when he never did, and thought Girard was the Avs best shutdown defenseman a couple years ago.
Even during the last few games EJ's still made lots of really good plays. Winning battles, rushing the puck well on the breakout, clearing pucks, playing physical, making big shot blocks, saving goals on the goal line. Nobody ever mentions this though.
This is why the "EJ's a bottom pairing defenseman falling off a cliff" false narrative took hold so easily years ago. Same with how everyone remembered how good he was in the playoffs a few seasons ago, and then when he missed games to injury, nearly everyone forgot and went back to the old narrative. Why do we cherry pick his bad moments so often and take for granted all his good moments? Especially when the good moments far out weigh the bad ones. It's like 95/5.
And it's just flat out objectively false to say that injuries have taken away his speed and ability to win battles. I don't even know how AJ could come to that conclusion after watching him all year. That's as bad as AJ Mleczko repeatedly saying the Avs are heavy up the middle, because she doesn't really pay attention to the Avs. EJ's literally skating better than he has in years, doing a bunch of Girard like spino-rama's, and he's won a shit ton of battles in the D zone. By far the most on the team.
I swear nobody really watches EJ play defense or watches defenseman defend in general. They just watch the puck carrier. It's the same reason people thought Barrie had taken leaps and bounds defensively when he never did, and thought Girard was the Avs best shutdown defenseman a couple years ago.
Even during the last few games EJ's still made lots of really good plays. Winning battles, rushing the puck well on the breakout, clearing pucks, playing physical, making big shot blocks, saving goals on the goal line. Nobody ever mentions this though.