during the last number of seasons, McDavid's level of play has been crazy. but, which stretch of hockey would you consider McDavid to be at his very best?
This idea that McDavid's 2022/23 season was less impressive because he scored a lot on the PP while having less PP ice time than either MacKinnon or Kucherov did in the 2023/24 is one of the more inconsistent ones I've seen on here. And yet I've seen it twice now.most impressed I was with his play was in the 2022 playoffs especially the last three games against LA and the first three games against Calgary which were deserving of all the hype he gets as one of the absolutely best ever, that playoffs his stats looked less than his play, in all the other examples I feel the stats flatter his play
everything else I feel has been pretty overhyped
2023 was a powerplay merchant year and despite his vast lead over everyone that year in stats he couldn't muster even a slim lead in the 5v5 category and the Kucherov and MacKinnon both hit 140 the next year (with less powerplay reliance) although this year he really showed he could score goals a bunch in different ways than the usual chip shot so that was impressive
2024 playoffs was up and down it took him until the Dallas series to be the clear best player on his team and then the Florida series was again up and down
2021 is definitely last, covid asterix north division short year where like he tore up a couple teams playing them so often (so for example Toronto didn't have too much trouble against him) and he sucked in the playoffs vs the Jets
If scoring on the power play is a bad thing to you or something that makes you diminish a player, then you need to reevaluate your understanding of hockey.
If scoring on the power play is a bad thing to you or something that makes you diminish a player, then you need to reevaluate your understanding of hockey.