I watched it. And to be honest, Tanguay was invisible for much of it. To the point that I thought he was hurt. But once I saw him again, I did not see this plethora of horribad plays that he apparently made.
Lets look at the categories Tangs led the team in for this game:
War On Ice BUF@COL 01202016
5v5: G, A1, P, iHSC, iSC, C+/-, F+/-, G+/-, CF, FF.
So he led in Goals, assists, individual scoring chances, individual high danger scoring chances, on-ice shots attempted (blocked or no) count AND differential, plus most of the same categories for all situations, but Duchene passes him in some, thanks in part to almost double the PP time.
And his goal was not gifted to him by Soderberg. That pass was deflected about 45º...it did not go where Soda intended. Tangs had to see it, get to it, and lift it backhand right away, with enough pace to beat the goalie. All skills an NHL player should have, yes. But the consensus around here seems to be that Tangs is not an NHL player anymore. And if it was that easy to score in that kind of situation, why didn't Duchene, MacK, Barrie, etc. score when given like 20 seconds of goal mouth scramble? Do they suck even worse than Tangs?
But wait, are we going back to "stats don't matter, wins matter"... cause we won the game, thanks to Tanguay. I will be the first to say that stats are not the whole story. And I will admit I might be giving him more leeway than maybe he deserves at this point. But it is plainly obvious to me that many folks are seeing what they want to see from the old man. Or for some, maybe it is because he is a shell of his former self, back when he played here as a kid, so he sucks in comparison to what they expect and are used to.
As for fans at the rink saying he sucked....is that the same rink I heard people shouting "Yzerman sucks, he's a worthless piece of..." back in the day? General fans are not the most reliable judges of skill. Here is generally better....but one problem here is the attitude that youth>>>>>>all. Tanguay is getting older. He may not have many (or any) years left after this one. But his play tonight was NOT that bad. Yes, he had some mistakes. Yes, he is going to look slow next to MacK or Duchene. But he is still easily the best hands on the team. Would I like him on the 3/4 line with Iggy...yes, I want Rants or Grigs to get the chance on the top line, and Tanguay's chemistry with Iggy will help that line produce, especially if you put a speedy center between them to chase everything down.
But I am done arguing about it. People want to bash the guy that won the game for us, fine. Gotta have something to ***** about, and no way it is gong to be the young stud that took a bad penalty, and was team worst in shot differential. Or the face of the franchise that was a team worst -6 in C+/- 5v5. It will be the guy that made a couple visible mistakes early, is not as fast as his linemates, and did not make enough flashy good plays to make up for it (despite the G and A).