I am a Capitals fan that watches every game. I don't think Ovechkin is any good defensively overall, not consistently. I don't think he's much better at passing.
I do think that he is significantly better at both than he was his first few years. Low bar there. He makes some good defensive plays and some good passes sometimes. He is certainly trying to pass more often than he used to.
It is so difficult to put the puck in the net, and he seems to be so much better at doing that than everyone else in the world, and since scoring more goals than the other team is the object of the game, I will say that I believe him to be the most valuable player playing today, despite his glaring flaws. Specifically, what I mean by that is this: if you throw all active players into a draft pool, and all the teams draft for a league that will last exactly one year, I believe the first player you should pick is Ovechkin, still, today. I believe that has been true every year of his career so far.
That will stop being the case pretty soon though, I think. I give it one more year, two at most.
Not the prettiest player to watch, and, really, the beauty of the game is an important part of why most of us watch it, at least at an unconscious level. There is a lot of cognitive dissonance involved when I think about his overall value. I am not sure that I am right about what I am saying.
