Name the centres better than Eichel today

Black Kevin

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Nov 19, 2019
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well your list is horrible lol you gotta had at the very least Draisailt Matthews and Malkin.

Drai for sure, they are on the same level afaiac. Malkin? Have you seen him play for the last three years? Matthews? Get the f*** outta here...
 

HockeyWooot

Registered User
Jan 28, 2020
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McDavid, MacKinnon, Matthews, Crosby, Draisaitl, Barkov.

I'm not even sure if he's behind four of those players. I am sure, though, that Buffalo is a morale-sapping trainwreck.

Eichel's output relative to his teammates is absurd. McDavid and Draisaitl* are the only players that I can think of offhand who are comparable in that regard.

* Yes, I am aware they are teammates. Treat them as a set.

This is THE list. There are other centres that are debatable but these are the ones that are firmly ahead of Eichel currently.
 

The Moose is Loose

Registered User
Jun 28, 2017
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St.Louis
McDavid
Draisaitl
Mackinnon
Matthews
Crosby
Barkov

I'd take him over Point, Aho, Barzal, Bergeron, or Schiefele who are being listed here a decent amount here.
I'd take him over Crosby too if we are thinking about this in terms of value since he's so much younger, even if Crosby is better on the ice.
 

The Moose is Loose

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For the playoffs, or next season, I'd take these guys before Eichel:

1. McDavid
2. MacKinnon
3. Barkov
4. Draisaitl
5. Aho
6. Scheifele
7. Stamkos
8. Barzal
9. Malkin
10. Zibanejad
11. Point
12. O'Reilly
13. Bergeron
14. Miller
15. Kopitar
16. Bäckström
17. Seguin
18. Kuznetsov
19. Krejci
20. Couturier
21. Horvat
22. Suzuki

I have absolutely zero confidence in Eichel's ability to play winning hockey. Being an all-around-problem just oooozes from everything he does.
Suzuki over Eichel? Is that a joke
 

Confucius

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Feb 8, 2009
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Eichel isn't top in the top ten Centres, c'mon he broke 30 goals once in his career. He's the most overrated player in the league.
 

Eat The Rich

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Jun 17, 2017
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Drai for sure, they are on the same level afaiac. Malkin? Have you seen him play for the last three years? Matthews? Get the f*** outta here...

.72 G/GP over the past two seasons and .6 G/GP over a career aren't good anymore?

What's the baseline here?
 

Rebels57

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Sep 28, 2014
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McDavid, Matthews, Draisaitl, Mackinnon, Crosby, Barkov, Aho, Kopitar, Point, Scheifele, Bergeron, O'Rielly. He's offensively better than some of those guys, but his defensive flaws bring his overall down for me. If he can get his compete level up and his 200ft game maybe he'll be a top 10 or even top 5 very soon, as of today I would say those guys are all better overall players than him.

If you're going to include guys like Bergeron, Kopitar, and O'Reilly then you also have to include Couturier. They are all in one tier of upper-echelon two-way C's and Couturier won the Selke over them last season.

Personally i'd take Eichel over all 4 though going forward though. He's younger and likely to hit a new level once he's out of Buffalo.
 

Confucius

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Feb 8, 2009
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Surprised Tavares isn't mentioned.

JT last six years 190 goals 228 assists 418 points
Eichel six years 139 goals 216 assists 355 points.

And there is no way Eichel's D is better than JT's
 
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Confucius

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You have to be biased out of your damn mind if you actually think Tavares is better lol
Why, which player put up the most points in the last 6 years, which scored the most goals? But somehow the guy with the inferior numbers is better. LOL!
 

BFLO

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Eichel isn't top in the top ten Centres, c'mon he broke 30 goals once in his career. He's the most overrated player in the league.
Eichel is a 30g center who's scored 82 points once in his career in the same way that Matthews is only a 40g center who's never scored 82 points in a season. They've both been plagued by injuries and have had 2 seasons cut short by a pandemic. If Jack continues to be this injury prone he's destined to end up as Malkin-lite, top 5ish talent when he's on the ice and healthy, but can't average more than 65 games a season and never comes close to earning the hardware Malkin has earned.

Also LOL at the people saying ROR is better than Eichel. ROR wasn't better than Jack when they both played for the Sabres. The criticisms of ROR when he was a Sabre were the same that we're seeing for Eichel now, not a winner, not a leader, bad attitude, doesn't have heart.. etc. HF boards didn't even rate ROR as a top 31 center, then he gets traded for scraps to a competent organization and the narrative shifts.

I don't want the Sabres to trade Eichel, but I almost want to see him play for someone else to see the narrative shift just like it did for ROR.
 

Confucius

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Eichel is a 30g center who's scored 82 points once in his career in the same way that Matthews is only a 40g center who's never scored 82 points in a season. They've both been plagued by injuries and have had 2 seasons cut short by a pandemic. If Jack continues to be this injury prone he's destined to end up as Malkin-lite, top 5ish talent when he's on the ice and healthy, but can't average more than 65 games a season and never comes close to earning the hardware Malkin has earned.

Also LOL at the people saying ROR is better than Eichel. ROR wasn't better than Jack when they both played for the Sabres. The criticisms of ROR when he was a Sabre were the same that we're seeing for Eichel now, not a winner, not a leader, bad attitude, doesn't have heart.. etc. HF boards didn't even rate ROR as a top 31 center, then he gets traded for scraps to a competent organization and the narrative shifts.

I don't want the Sabres to trade Eichel, but I almost want to see him play for someone else to see the narrative shift just like it did for ROR.
Eichel is not and has proven by his offence numbers is not as good as Tavares, let alone Mathews, who by the way has scored 60 more goals than Eichel while playing one less season.
 

OKR

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Nov 18, 2015
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Why, which player put up the most points in the last 6 years, which scored the most goals? But somehow the guy with the inferior numbers is better. LOL!
Because if you’ve seen them play in recent years, you can pretty easily tell Eichel is the better player. You can also tell it by the fact that Eichel has better PPG than Tavares in the last 5 years as well as better career ppg.

Eichel had 0.85ppg this season on awful Sabres team.

Tavares had 0.89ppg in stacked Leafs.
 

BFLO

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Eichel is not and has proven by his offence numbers is not as good as Tavares, let alone Mathews, who by the way has scored 60 more goals than Eichel while playing one less season.
So by your logic Tavares is better than Matthews too? Career high 47 goals is tied with Matthews but Tavares has 4 seasons better than Matthews career high for points.
 

Confucius

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So by your logic Tavares is better than Matthews too? Career high 47 goals is tied with Matthews but Tavares has 4 seasons better than Matthews career high for points.
Well here you are cherry picking Tavares best 5 seasons against Mathews only 5 seasons. So that is wrong. Over the last 5 seasons Mathews has the better offence, 199 goals to 157, down to 139 over 6 seasons for Eichel.
 

Pi

Registered User
Nov 16, 2010
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McDavid, Matthews, MacKinnon, Draisaitl, Barkov, Crosby etc are all easily much better than Eichel, and sorry I also forgot Malkin.

He's in the next tier with Stamkos, Tavares, Kopitar, Aho, Point, ROR etc.
 
Last edited:

BFLO

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Well here you are cherry picking Tavares best 5 seasons against Mathews only 5 seasons. So that is wrong. Over the last 5 seasons Mathews has the better offence, 199 goals to 157
Last 5 seasons
Matthews 1.05ppg
Eichel 1.02 ppg
Tavares 0.97 ppg.

There's a bigger gap between Eichel and Tavares than there is between Eichel and Matthews.
 

The90

Registered User
Feb 27, 2017
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Because if you’ve seen them play in recent years, you can pretty easily tell Eichel is the better player. You can also tell it by the fact that Eichel has better PPG than Tavares in the last 5 years as well as better career ppg.

Eichel had 0.85ppg this season on awful Sabres team.

Tavares had 0.89ppg in stacked Leafs.
I take Eichel over tavares 100%. But your argument isn’t the greatest. Some players thrive being ‘the’ guy like eichel is in Buffalo. Karlsson in ottawa vs karlsson in San Jose is a good example of that. You can’t definitively say ‘oh well with better players he’d get more points’ all else equal, sure. Maybe that’s right. But consider that tavares now plays behind matthews, and is putting up 75 point paces in a 2c role. Eichel now slots in behind marner and Matthews on the depth chart into the 2c role. Maybe he gets better pp looks, with better players, but he’s also playing less minutes overall, and getting less touches of the puck because he’s not the best option anymore. Just saying essentially you can’t rely on an uptick in production based solely on better players. There are more factors than that.
 

Confucius

There is no try, Just do
Feb 8, 2009
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Last 5 seasons
Matthews 1.05ppg
Eichel 1.02 ppg
Tavares 0.97 ppg.

There's a bigger gap between Eichel and Tavares than there is between Eichel and Matthews.
I hope you are one of the guys that accepts Mathews goals per game stats, many don't. lol. Anyway the career totals for the last 5 years tell the story. Eichel finishes 3rd out of the 3.
 
Last edited:

OKR

Registered User
Nov 18, 2015
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I take Eichel over tavares 100%. But your argument isn’t the greatest. Some players thrive being ‘the’ guy like eichel is in Buffalo. Karlsson in ottawa vs karlsson in San Jose is a good example of that. You can’t definitively say ‘oh well with better players he’d get more points’ all else equal, sure. Maybe that’s right. But consider that tavares now plays behind matthews, and is putting up 75 point paces in a 2c role. Eichel now slots in behind marner and Matthews on the depth chart into the 2c role. Maybe he gets better pp looks, with better players, but he’s also playing less minutes overall, and getting less touches of the puck because he’s not the best option anymore. Just saying essentially you can’t rely on an uptick in production based solely on better players. There are more factors than that.
I was talking stricky about this season with that point, no Sabres players we’re thrieving that’s for sure.

And if Tavares can do that with those minutes and opportunities, so would Eichel as he clearly is the better player of the two.
 

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