Actually, he had one of the best GA/60 on the PK on the team during his three seasons.
For some reason, when fans here hate someone they can't credit them with anything good, but when they love a player, they brook no criticism.
VdV was a good PK player, he was replacement level or below at ES.
He played b/c there was dreck behind him (and the players behind him are long gone from the organization).
Ok, his average was around the ~6 GA/60 mark where he never played the highest TOI on the PK. On the best PK the Flyers had during his tenure, he was ranked 3/4 for the most F used for GA/60 during the best PK season they had with him. Couturier and Read beat him.
In NHL standards that puts him right about 84th in the NHL during the Flyers best PK season for players that played more than 100TOI on the PK. That means 67% of PKers have a better GA/60 than he did for those parameters. That puts him as your 3rd best PKer for the AVERAGE TEAM. So, was he a great PKer, no. Was he good for what the flyers had, maybe- since their PK sucked.
Using your analysis: (14-15 - 16-17)
He was the best on the Flyers, (second to Wayne Simmonds) for GA/60. That is due to an outlier 14-15 year where his TOI was not high.
Putting this into the league perspective: 64/256 which is a 1/4.
If you normalize his seasons: 101/256 which is ~40%.
So, he was slightly better than average. That makes him a + 2nd partner on the first PK unit. 1/3 he was a prime #1, 2/3 he was a ~2/4, and 3/3 he was 3/4.
His pattern of PK play is the definition of regression. Still, average at best isn’t necessarily something to laud over or even defend.
This is also just ONE metric you’re basing your argument off of