He's a product of the line he's been playing on. Put him on a line with Perreault and Little, and I bet he struggles to score 15 goals.
Not fair really, as most of the players will fail to score 20 or even 15 goals if they have to play the whole season with Little, unless they get a real goal scoring role on the power play like Laine has had. And of course a guy with the shot like Laine might as well score over 20 goals with Little even without much of power play chances, but it for sure wouldn’t be easy.
I like Connor a lot anyway, and I think he is capable of being the 2nd or 3rd best goal scorer for the Jets consistently. Anyway close to Scheifele with his goal scoring skills and probably a bit ahead of Ehlers.
I see Connor as a potentially better player than Ehlers in the future, as it seems to me that Connor has better hockey IQ than Ehlers and he seems to also be a better natural goalscorer than Ehlers. Connor has also almost the speed and skating to match with Ehlers, but to me Connor’s other areas are a bit better than Ehlers’s.
Well, both are pretty weak physically and often in trouble in battles, but Ehler’s does look a bit better defensively to my eyes. On the other hand Connor is a clearly smarter, more intensive and generally better forechecker. And I like his smarts and efficiency in the offensive zone.
I just generally like Connor’s game a lot. He has the smarts and many other great abilities. He does need for sure the right kind of linemates, but so what? So does everyone else too. Put anyone to play with players that don’t fit very well with their playstyle and strengths and weaknesses, and even top class players play clearly worse and less productive than with more optimal linemates.