I think calling his play "average" was just as egregious. Out of 258 defensemen with at least 100 minutes played, he was 258th in xGF%. And those were easy sheltered minutes
Well yes, my assessment of his play was that it was fairly poor overall, but people will lose their minds about that so I don't bother with that any longer. Playing only 9 minutes with Marincin is an objective fact.
Marincin is not a good partner for Liljegren (or Sandin) entering the league. Perhaps neither was ready (my position that Sandin was - if they had done it right - and Liljegren was not), but regardless if you are not going to bring them into the league in a proper way then it is all a waste. And the Leafs have shown that they are not going to bring either into the league in the proper way. I feel sorry for them, but you can't chose the team who drafts you.
I don't have much confidence in advanced stats for D, but yes, his numbers are very low - and the general expectation - played out time after time throughout the league - is that a young, very sheltered D will have extremely good underlying numbers. However, people will just yell and stomp their feet and say that the numbers are meaningless even though these same people would feel that the numbers are the most important thing ever if they showed the opposite.
My personal view of Sandin and Liljegren for the 2019-20 season is that Leafs' management should be absolutely ashamed of the pathetic way they brought those two into the league. Just embarrassing if, as I assume, this organization expects them to play decent roles in the future.
The Leafs' have never been good at developing young D into the NHL, but they seem to be trying to somehow get worse at it. If you are not going to play them much, or you don't think they are ready to play a decent role then send them down, and play the youngster with a partner who knows what the f*** is going on, who will allow them to play to their strengths and give some cover to their weaknesses while they improve those aspects of the game (they didn't do that with Dermott - and they have not been doing that with Sandin or Liljegren). Boqvist's partner was Keith, Hughes' partner was Tanev, Makar's partner while not incredibly experienced is massive and strong in the areas when Makar needs to improve. McAvoy has always played with Chara. And unsurprisingly each one of those players made remarkable progress over their first months in the NHL - like drinking from a fire hose. Neither Sandin or Liljegren have made any progress (and both stints Sandin looked worse each subsequent game) and Dermott didn't improve at all over his first 2 years in the league.
Those other players are playing for teams that are trying to turn them into the absolute best possible versions of themselves. Toronto is doing the opposite (and the same goes for Buffalo with Dahlin).
Just as an example comparing Toronto now to Toronto from 7 - 10 years ago - First 11 games (age is based on first game):
Rielly - 19 years 210 days - average time on ice: 18:03
Gardiner - 21 yrs 94 d - ATOI 17:55
Dermott - 21 yrs 15 d - ATOI 16:29
Sandin - 19 yrs 209 d - ATOI 13:38
Liljegren - 20 yrs 263 d - ATOI 10:18
That is bad.