Former NHLer makes surprising statement about Kirill Kaprizov and Auston Matthews
The always opinionated John Scott was at it again recently when he appeared to suggest that Minnesota Wild forward Kirill Kaprizov was every bit as talented as Auston Matthews, going so far as to discredit Matthews' 60-goal season.
Scott appears to believe that Auston Matthews is only as good as Mitch Marner allows him to be, stating on his Dropping the Gloves podcast that if Kaprizov played alongside Marner for 82 games, he'd be a lock for 60 goals.
Look. I have nothing against Kaprizov, who just scored 108 points in 81 games. All indications are that Kaprizov is an excellent, probably even elite, hockey player. Scott does have a point that what Kaprizov accomplished last season playing with a pair of career 2nd liners is very impressive. But Matthews just scored 60 goals and 106 points in 73 games. It included a stretch of of 50 games where Matthews scored 51 goals.
There's no guarantee that Marner and Kaprizov would have the same chemistry that Marner and Matthews have. To say that Matthews is only Matthews because of Mitch Marner is both unfair and untrue. Auston Matthews is a generational goal scorer. Not only that, but he doesn't sacrifice his strong defensive play in pursuit of his offense. Matthews is a unicorn. As great as Kaprizov is, he's not a generational anything and he's certainly not a unicorn. He's just another highly skilled Russian winger.
| POLL | ||
SEPTEMBRE 9 | 805 ANSWERS Former NHLer makes surprising statement about Kirill Kaprizov and Auston Matthews Who would you rather build a team around? | ||
| Auston Matthews | 646 | 80.2 % |
| Kirill Kaprizov | 159 | 19.8 % |
| List of polls | ||
