Well, he leads the team in scoring. As a 19 year old rookie. And his +/- isn't the worst on the team. Yeah, it's more about how the Flyers are bad, than MM is good, but still. And I'd say he looks pretty decent overall. When your $6.2M linemate has 1 point, 5 points in 6 games isn't even decent, but very good.
From preseason it was evident that Michkov was already the flyers best player ( I know this is not overly impressive) but people pushed back when I said this and retorted that his stats were due to only preseason and that the vets were taking it easy. People thought I made that statement just by counting stats.
You evaluate his overall play and his skills. The early regular season is proving that he is by far the flyers best player, but someone can say Michkov has 5 points, Laughton has 4 points. They are similar.
Watch the games and it is clear as day. I dont remember during the regular season where a teammate has set him up for a prime scoring chance yet....and no I do not count the 2nd goal in edmonton as a prime set up where michkov received the puck near the goal line.
Is he perfect ? Not at all, still need some man strength and improve skating top speed which I also mentioned will determine his ultimate ceiling. If he doesn't improve those 2 things, I don't think he will be a superstar/potential MVP candidate like some are saying.
But so far he has not disappointed considering all the circumstances.
A scouting report before the 23 draft mentioned this very possible problem where finding linemates for Michkov would not be simple, because he does not play like a typical forward. He will need the proper complementing pieces to extract all of his talents. This applies to all players, but not to Michkov's degree.