Calling Bear a 1st pairing RHD is grossly over valuing him. I think he'll have a decent career for sure but like pretty much every Oilers player, at 5v5 they are giving up more than they create. He's negative in most categories, according to Natural Statrick.
Bear is positive in every category except HDGF% rel:
I can see you don't know how to read a stats table. That wasn't "this season", the stats you quoted were "with Caleb Jones on the past 20 games" only. But yeah, keep up your narrative.
Stats like CF% and xGF% are influenced by all 5 guys and should be looked at in relation with teammates. Also consider that Larsson has faced the toughest comp pretty much since he entered the league. Larson has had
- positive CF% rel in 4 of the past 7 seasons
- positive GF% rel in 5 of the past 7 seasons
- positive xGF% rel in 6 of the past 7 seasons
Whatever. He's not available so I don't really care what you think of him. Keep up your holy anti-Larsson crusade if you must. Every coach Larsson has ever played for has trusted him against the world's best forwards; that means something.
Dude Gagner is your best player for possession and expected goals on your entire team. The whole team sucks at 5v5
His ceiling is Nuge. If EDM swaps back to a different system where McDavid plays with Draisaitl then he can safely play 2C. Even if not, EDM's largest need for a while has been a third line center.
Bear was #3 in oilers defense ice time and the oilers also experienced injuries. Where he had some time on the top pair with Nurse, it is clear that in a healthy lineup Klefbom is #1 and plays with Larsson, making the Nurse-Bear tandem your 2nd pair.
Get off the high horse and take Bear for what he is. He's good, but not as amazing as you make him out to be.
Where he had some time on the top pair with Nurse, it is clear that in a healthy lineup Klefbom is #1 and plays with Larsson, making the Nurse-Bear tandem your 2nd pair.
Again with the attempt at marginalizing the player. Bear played nearly 1200 minutes with Nurse on the 1st pair. To put that into context, Hughes only played 1132 minutes TOTAL at 5v5 this year. Bear played 1308 total: 1152 with Nurse and 111 with Klefbom.