Simon Edvinsson

[RedHawkDown]

Lidstrom wasn't a consistent Norris winner because he was great at defense. He won Norris' because he was great at defense while putting up 70pts a year


4th lines and 3rd pairs are full no offense, elite defensive players. It's extremely hard to find a player elite at both, but was easier to find one elite at defense. Maatta has been by far the Wings best pure "defender" since he's been here. But it doesn't matter because he isn't capable of generating offense at a reasonable rate to justify higher deployment

This isn’t true. 4th line and 3rd pairs are just shittier players. If you took Raymond and tasked him with purely shutdown duties without scoring, he would be way better at it than everybody in our bottom 6.

Defense is more systems based than offense, so it’s easier to learn, but it isn’t easy. Good players are usually just better at everything in hockey than bad players; a lot of them just focus on offense because that’s where their creativity shines and because nobody else on the team can do it.

Most 4th liners and 3rd pairings are also shit defensively in addition to being shit offensively. That’s why they mostly play against other 3rd pairings and 4th lines instead of playing against top lines.

Elite defenders who put up minimal offense don’t play on third pairings. Maatta is not an example of that. He doesn’t play higher because he is just a mid player in general, not because he doesn’t generate offense. If he was elite defensively he’d be playing top pair. Examples of that are guys like Slavin, MA Vlasic, Alex Vlasic, Carlo, Faber, etc all of whom are 1st pairing dmen or play at that level on their teams.

 

[RedHawkDown]

I think higher level players choose that yeah, not the ones trying to break into the league. I think Chiarot knows he shouldn't randomly try to rush the puck, or repeatedly shove someone in the upper back while chasing them around the ice. It's just more fun to play that way lol. It's not a coincidence a coach like Torts gets everyone to be elite at defense within a few months

These are professionals man. If Chiarot was good enough to play like Slavin if he just stopped trying to have “fun”, he would do it and make 6.5M a year with an 8 year contract that’s considered a steal instead of 4.5 a year short term that we’ll dump as soon as it’s over.

Everyone knows what they “should” do, the ability to do it at a high level in game and make those split second decisions is where skill and talent comes in. And that applies to defense as much as it does offense.

 

[izlez]

It's amazing that a guy like Wallinder, a smooth skating 6'4 defenseman with offensive ability, could have all his dreams come true tomorrow if only he put in .001% effort into just flipping a switch and being elite at defense, but his response is "Naw. I don't do defense. It's not fun."