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Zach Werenski should be considered for the Norris?

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majormajor said:
FWIW Vlasic doesn't lose ground to Fantilli at all, Vlasic's only issue is that he drifted too far wide. His speed was fine.

What's more impressive is how quickly Werenski leaves Celebrini in the dust. (I'd say Toffoli too, but we all know how slow he is).

I also could have shared clips from last game where Werenski had a breakaway goal and nearly got a hat trick goal in OT on another breakaway. His speed isn't talked about enough.
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Celebrini was flat footed, he went for the stick check then took the third man high and defended the drop pass. You can see him shift gears once he sees vlasic pick up his guy. , Werenski was Rutta's guy. Werenski was moving out at the time of the shot and the block/interception had him with momentum totally opposite of the play. Vlasic was pinching in which maybe wasn't the best decision at that point, but I guess the team was pushing for offense.

Someone with more knowledge of hockey can tell me how good Rutta's reads were on that play, first to take the shot when Eklund was going to the boards and Toffoli was loaded for the one-timer to his left. Then to drift to the middle on his turn once he realized the speed Werenski was carrying. He may have been looking for a Celebrini tip play or just to get it on the goalie's pads with Celebrini in tight, but he failed to get it through and it came right back down his throat.
 
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Rowlet said:
While that's true, there is a definitive answer of who has been better that we can discuss and that's much more interesting to talk about. If you want to disregard numbers because we can't read the voters minds or predict the future, you don't have to keep replying, but separate from what voters will think 4 or 5 months from now, there is a real answer as to who has been better so far, and that's Quinn Hughes.
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At this point of the season, I have Hughes ahead myself, what he's doing is really impressive, but in my book it's far from "definitive". Contrary to what you seem to think, the better CBJ as a team seem to be doing, the more it shifts me towards Werenski because his play this season is one of the most important reasons why the team is doing so well. He's also really effective at what he does, I don't think his value comes from driving shot metrics and possession. He's also blazing hot at the moment so remains to be seen how sustainable his present form is, we'll just have to let the season play out and see. I don't think xG is the definitive stat that tells you who is better, you'd have an easier time convincing me using actual goals, despite how much randomness that has and despite xG being better at predicting the future. It's not like xG is some perfect stat, it sort of does what it's supposed to do but it does have it flaws. In the end goals are what the game is decided on. 5v5 Werenski is +16 and Hughes is +15, but relative to team mates that +15 of Hughes is even more impressive.

It's a team game, so a guy doing great and being a big part of elevating one of the supposedly worst teams in the league (heck, before season started most people have had them as a bottom 3-5 team in the league, maybe even at the very bottom) seems more impressive to me than a guy having absolutely great numbers in a team that's severely underperforming. Pretty much this same Canucks team gave a hard time to cup finalist Oilers team in the playoffs. Their present suck doesn't appear to be any fault of Hughes but the team around him doing poorly doesn't really give him any bonus points, especially since they are not supposed to be a bad team. In a way it's unfair to him but same has been true for every player doing great in a bad situation in the past.
 
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