He can absolutely play without stars, he just won't score much. He's a valuable player but at the right price. I would have been happy to keep him in TO but anything more than 3.5 is insane. He's a 3rd line grinder who can play a certain role higher up. If he isn't with McDavid his contract will look really had fast

Edit: oops, now I see that my comment is redundant.

It's not a huge sample size but it's the only sample size available, and the data available says that Draisaitl can handle himself just fine. In the 11 games without McDavid where he was 1.6 P/G, he also had points in 9/11 games, he was still consistent through the stretch and didn't just rack up a couple big games. I would say the Hart/Ted Lindsay Trophies in his trophy case would point to both the players and writers agreeing that Draisaitl is not "just a product of McDavid".

When it comes to the playoffs, Drai actually outproduces McDavid. Over the 21 games they have both played Drai has 27 points to McDavid's 22.

Get back to me when Matthews has a Hart... last Leafs Hart trophy was even longer ago than their last cup win. Drai has more playoff points than Matthews in 2/3 the games... Drai has been over P/G the 3 times he's made the playoffs, Matthews has hit P/G once out of the 5 times his team made it. But by all means... he's just purely a product of McDavid...

Not purely a product of McDavid but massively inflated by him. He's a good player no doubt but he isn't at all a top 10 centre

Ah yes, using trophies to measure players success. In that case drai is better than Mackinnon right? Just because he has a hart and Mack doesn’t. U wanna talk about the playoffs last year? How many games did the oilers win? And how many times have the oilers even made the playoffs in the McDavid era? Literally 40% of drais points last year came on the PP and guess who he plays with? And at least 10% of his reg season points came from playing with McDavid- check the stats if u need to. That means around 50% of drais points came from playing with McDavid. If that doesn’t mean he’s mcdavids product,
Idk what does.

The whole "product of McDavid" argument shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how hockey - and the world in general really - works. I am better at my job when I have great people on my team, that's just a fact. Of course Draisaitl does better with McDavid, but McDavid also does better with Draisaitl than without. Leafs fans knocking Draisaitl has a particular rank when you consider Matthews and Marner are almost NEVER apart. Bringing up MacKinnon is similar because he pretty much ALWAYS plays with his team's #2, #3 and #4 offensive players: Rantanen, Makar and Landeskog. Tampa runs their top-3 offensive forwards on the same line too.

The fact is that Draisaitl has the second most points in the NHL over the past 3+ seasons BY FAR (McDavid 318, Draisaitl 299, Kane 260) while also being a top-3 goal scorer (Matthews 125, Draisaitl 124, Ovechkin 123) and you don't get to those heights by riding someone else's coattails EVER. If this were possible, why wasn't Nugent-Hopkins (a decent player in his own right) a top-3 scorer last season? He spent just as much time with McDavid as Draisaitl did.

Literally 40% of drais points last year came on the PP and guess who he plays with? And at least 10% of his reg season points came from playing with McDavid- check the stats if u need to. That means around 50% of drais points came from playing with McDavid. If that doesn’t mean he’s mcdavids product,
Idk what does.

L

This guy clearly doesn't understand hockey. "McDavid and Draisaitl play together so Draisaitl must be product of McDavid". Take the Hyman goal in the opener for example where both McDavid and Draisaitl get assists. McDavid throws a cross seam pass to Draisaitl who one touches the pass tape to tape through a defender for a Hyman tap in. Yes, McDavid passed Drai the puck but it takes an exceptionally talented player to make the pass as quickly and accurately as Drai does. In the NHLPA player poll, Drai had 3 most votes (behind Kane and Backstrom) for best passer in the league and double the % McDavid got. The main reason in my opinion that the Oilers PP has been at the top of the league in back to back years is the dual threat of Draisaitl from the bottom of the circle... He has both a deadly one-timer and the ability to thread the needle with a pass cross-crease. He doesn't rack up the secondary assists Barrie gets for dropping the puck for McD in his own zone and this isn't Thornton-Cheechoo from the Sharks 15 years ago. This is 2 very good players that feed off of each other.

Lmao it’s crazy how u oilers fans don’t understand basic stats maybe because u were dropped as kids? U can say all u want but drai is a product of McDavid

O

In the same way Daniel was a product of Henrik

Draisaitl is now leading the league in goals, points and goal differential (forwards). First player in the league to hit 20 points in the first 9 games since Mario Lemieux did it about 20 years ago.

Just a product of McDavid.

And tell me how many of drais goals were assisted by McDavid and vice versa….. he’s still a product of McDavid

I don't ever remember this being the mentality when Malkin and Crosby were in there prime

If you said McDavid is a product of Draisaitl you'd have an argument. GF - GA at 5v5 this season:

97 + 29: 7-2
97 alone: 2-4
29 alone: 4-0

Draisaitl is the guy driving this team this season, not McDavid.