Two voters left Matthews off their Hart Trophy list; their ballots are horrendous
On Tuesday night, Auston Matthews was awarded the Ted Lindsay Memorial Trophy as the League's best player as voted by the NHLPA. He also walked away with the Hart Memorial Trophy as the League's most valuable player as voted by the Professional Hockey Writers Association. Matthews placed first on 119 out of 195 Hart ballots. McDavid was a distant second place with 29 first place votes.
Of the 195 members of the PWHA, only 2 left Matthews' name off their ballots. Matthews, the guy who scored 60 goals and 106 points in just 73 games, scored 51 goals over a 50 game stretch on his way to winning the Rocket Richard Trophy by a 5-goal margin. Two guys who make a lot more money than I do writing about sports decided Auston Matthews wasn't even in the top 5 Most Valuable Players in the NHL this season. Who are they you ask? Guillaume Lefrancois of Montreal based La Presse, and Seth Rorabaugh of The Pittsburgh Tribune Review.
Lefrancois' ballot had Panthers winger Jonathan Huberdeau first, Nashville's Roman Josi second, Minnesota's Kirill Kaprizov third, Rangers netminder Igor Shesterkin fourth and Art Ross winner, Connor McDavid in a lowly 5th place.
Look, Huberdeau had a great season - the best of his career - finishing 3rd in points. He also scored exactly half the amount of goals Auston Matthews did and had a negligible impact defensively. It's very hard to look at the Montreal based writer voting for the Quebec-born player and leaving the better American-born Toronto player off his ballot and not think there's a pile of anti-Toronto bias here.
Not to be outdone, Seth Rorabaugh had what is possibly the most insane ballot of anybody this year. 1st, Kaprizov, then Josi, Shesterkin, Huberdeau and... *squints*... J.T. Miller? Leaving Matthews off your ballot to vote for the guy from your home province is one thing. Leaving both the Rocket and Art Ross winners off your ballot completely to have J.T. Miller on there? Insanity. Matthews and McDavid were by far the best in the league this season. It is unfathomable that someone who is paid to write about hockey as a full time job and is regarded as one of the top 195 NHL writers in the world didn't see either of these two incredible hockey players in the top 5.
At the end of the day, Matthews was the best in the league this season. The overwhelming majority of the hockey world, writers and players, agree. Does it matter what one writer from Montreal and another from Pittsburgh have to say? No, but looking over their ballots was good enough for a laugh anyway. Perhaps, in the future, they'll work a little bit harder to hide their biases though. It's not a good look for people who are trusted to vote objectively.
