The Blue Jackets squandered an outrageous performance from Zach Werenski but largely suffered from the same problems that plagued their last game against this team.
Hot take: Zach Werenski is the best defenseman in the league. I never want him to leave.
Another huge issue is that Marchenko seems to have cooled off. Does the data support that? Might he be dealing with an injury?
Maybe you already covered this, but do you think Johnson's struggles are due to the systematic decrease in rush offense? It seems to me that Evason is making the same mistake as Vincent did, namely not coaching to the team's strengths.
Also, though I suspect there's nothing to it, their record has been especially terrible since Olivier got hurt.
Werenski has been a machine and doing it against difficult deployment, I can't really see an argument for excluding him from any top defenseman in the NHL conversations. He has the "will a team to wins" superpower and is devastating when he's pushing.
Marchenko has cooled off. Prior to his injury, which I think is safe to say is lingering, he was one of the top rush creators in the league. Now, that data also comes mostly pre-Fantilli as well. That line combination has largely been better than the Monahan iteration this season, depending on how you view it, but I think we've seen less dominant Marchenko. The Voronkov-Marchenko rush combination was lethal and now Fantilli wants some of those puck touches. If Fantilli and Marchenko start converting on their chances, they're both below expected depsite devastating finishing talent, it could change in a hurry.
It definitely feels Vincent-esque with KJ. Seems like the team prioritizes identity alignment rather than crafting lines that offer different flavors. He's looked fine in spurts, would have preferred a step forward in some aspect than just fine, and it seems like he's not Dean's priority. Him, Fantilli and Jenner have been a mostly good line, their forechecking in their brief return jumped out immediately, they're just all below average defensive players. He's overthinking it now but CBJ don't have incredible personnel to get him out of this either. He's caught between being a puckhandler and skating through middle vs embracing his lack of footspeed and focusing on passing through problems first. My advice would be for him to play slower, pass quicker but the team seems to want to create speed identity over all else this season. Hard to completely rule out some of his own bad habits and CBJ need him to be more self-sustaining if they're going to put all the chips in with him as a cup-winning-potential wing.
Hot take: Zach Werenski is the best defenseman in the league. I never want him to leave.
Another huge issue is that Marchenko seems to have cooled off. Does the data support that? Might he be dealing with an injury?
Maybe you already covered this, but do you think Johnson's struggles are due to the systematic decrease in rush offense? It seems to me that Evason is making the same mistake as Vincent did, namely not coaching to the team's strengths.
Also, though I suspect there's nothing to it, their record has been especially terrible since Olivier got hurt.
Werenski has been a machine and doing it against difficult deployment, I can't really see an argument for excluding him from any top defenseman in the NHL conversations. He has the "will a team to wins" superpower and is devastating when he's pushing.
Marchenko has cooled off. Prior to his injury, which I think is safe to say is lingering, he was one of the top rush creators in the league. Now, that data also comes mostly pre-Fantilli as well. That line combination has largely been better than the Monahan iteration this season, depending on how you view it, but I think we've seen less dominant Marchenko. The Voronkov-Marchenko rush combination was lethal and now Fantilli wants some of those puck touches. If Fantilli and Marchenko start converting on their chances, they're both below expected depsite devastating finishing talent, it could change in a hurry.
It definitely feels Vincent-esque with KJ. Seems like the team prioritizes identity alignment rather than crafting lines that offer different flavors. He's looked fine in spurts, would have preferred a step forward in some aspect than just fine, and it seems like he's not Dean's priority. Him, Fantilli and Jenner have been a mostly good line, their forechecking in their brief return jumped out immediately, they're just all below average defensive players. He's overthinking it now but CBJ don't have incredible personnel to get him out of this either. He's caught between being a puckhandler and skating through middle vs embracing his lack of footspeed and focusing on passing through problems first. My advice would be for him to play slower, pass quicker but the team seems to want to create speed identity over all else this season. Hard to completely rule out some of his own bad habits and CBJ need him to be more self-sustaining if they're going to put all the chips in with him as a cup-winning-potential wing.