Since moving to Montreal, Mike Matheson has played his finest hockey.
He broke the record for most points in a season in his first year with the squad, scoring 34 in 48 games.
He did it again last season, scoring 62 points in 82 games.
We know Matheson has defensive flaws beyond the points.
He’s not always reliable and makes questionable mistakes, but that’s typical with offensive-style defenders. They resemble each other.
However, 2,896 fans voted for the NHL’s top 80 defensemen in a poll (JFresh), and Matheson’s defensive shortcoming may be most crucial.
Matheson ranks 68th among the top-80 players at this position.
After all, Matheson was the 9th-scoring NHL defenseman last season.
He had his position among the great offensively, and that’s nothing to sneeze at.
On the other side, not seeing Matheson among the top-40 or top-50 players at his position implies only one thing.
Fans say he’s too awful defensively to really be one of the finest players on the blue line.
That’s the only reasonable explanation I can come up with, especially because Matheson finished last season in the top-10 for points among defensemen. Hard to ask for more, after all…
It’s also worth mentioning that Matheson is the only Habs player to break into the top-80 best defensemen in the JFresh survey.
Perhaps the picture will be different next year if Kaiden Guhle and Lane Hutson have a solid season…
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