Dobson is Carlson type. He can move the puck very well and is a big threat from the blue line, and his defense is fair enough - and young enough to continue improving. But unlike guys like Karlsson who were SO offensively dominant that simply having them on the ice 25 minutes a night meant the puck was mostly not in your end for those 25 minutes, which means you tilt the ice significantly enough to be a Norris nominee, even if your defense isn’t the bread and butter of your game. Guys like Carlson, while picking up a nomination here or there, have never been true Norris contenders because despite putting up numbers, they don’t tilt the ice and control play for nearly half a game the way guys like Karlsson do. It’s rare for a “purely” offensive D man to be able to impact the game so significantly that without being truly “good” at defense, they still mitigate goals against purely by the fact that when they’re on the ice the puck is rarely in their zone. Carlson is in that other group; good D who is a big time offensive threat and also decent defensively, but not a genuine game changer on either side of the ice. That’s Dobson. He’s a very good offensive D. He’s not remotely in bonafide 1D territory.
