Being Letang's partner is some of the hardest minutes in hockey - opposition best, 20 minutes a night, covering for a guy who wants to play superman and who'll put you in a bunch of hard spots. Expecting Riikola to thrive there full time is optimistic. Sending him out there for shifts here and there is a decent idea but that's about it.
And Riikola might throw hard hits, but put him on the boards and the puck is staying in the zone. Ditto Schultz.
Tbh, I'm with Pixies here. With Dumo and Marino out, the name of the game defensively is survival. We don't have the horses to impose our will and trying to do so will involve too many track meets. JJ-Letang is an abomination but it does at least take a lot of the heat and enough of it that Pettersson, our next best defensive dman, can survive the rest. Riikola? Deserves better chances, but removing the guys who can actually handle a bit of physicality from our defence kinda ruins things for him.