Quoting: Mediumyeet
Being a play driver is actually much more difficult on a bad team because you don't have quality players to assist you so you're taking more of the load by yourself. Reinhart was very good at Center this year and even if he doesn't play C somewhere else he's shown that he has the versatility to do so if necessary. Gaudreau is streaky and IMO too soft to be a guy you lean on in the playoffs, not to mention he is not good defensively whatsoever.
I really hate this narrative. Gaudreau is one of the most skilled puck handlers and best playmakers in the entire league, and shows up consistently. The bad in the playoffs narrative is foolish and not backed up by anyone with a brain who actually watched him play. He was triple teamed against Colorado, and Lindholm and Monahan were the guys who decided they would do absolutely nothing with the newfound space. The only bad thing he did was miss 3 breakaways in a row lol, but everyone can have a rough night. In the bubble he was scoring at above a career average rate and consistently creating chances, several times per night he would draw several Stars players to him, or go on a rush and burn past a couple guys, only to set up a linemate who proceeded to whiff on it, miss the net, be caught behind the play, or simply aim right at the goalie’s chest. It was incredibly aggravating. He’s never had an elite linemate, or a true goal scorer to complement him. If he had a guy like Matthews or Eichel on his line he’d be a 100 point guy every year and this playoff nonsense would be nowhere to be found, as he’d have a guy who could actually finish his plays. It also literally doesn’t matter how bad he is defensively, not everyone has to be great defensively. Sometimes you can just have an uber-talented guy who does nothing but create offense, and if you have a good defense corps you’ll be fine (and Calgary does have a good defense corps, not to mention Lindholm, Backlund, and Mangiapane are all excellent defensive forwards). Reinhart literally doesn’t have that kind of potential, he’s had an elite centre for years and never topped a 65 point pace over a full season (once again, I’d like to point out that Gaudreau has literally never scored at less than this pace in any single season and has a career high of 99 points), and while he may be fine defensively, he’s not good enough in his own end to bump his value significantly, it’s just not a detriment to his value. Basically what I’m saying about defense is that Gaudreau is so good his defensive woes don’t matter because you want him for his offense. Reinhart is not that good, so he needs to be at least decent defensively so as to not nerf his value, which he is, so fair play. Still not in the same stratosphere as Gaudreau, or even Monahan while we’re on the Flames.
As for being good this year, he shot 41% above his career average shooting percentage, which isn’t exactly sustainable, and he only won 45% of his faceoffs, which is obviously pretty bad. I really don’t think he’s more than an emergency fill in at center on a good team, and he’ll likely regress in goal production next year.