Erik Gustafsson's Icetime

[potatoetree]

Anyone concerned about Gustafsson's recent dip in icetime? It seems to correlate with Connor Murphy's return, who apparently is on the top pairing with Duncan Keith now.
I'm hoping it's just a temporary shakeup, but going down from 23 minutes to 16 minutes of icetime puts a damper on his consistency, even if he is still on the PP1 unit.

Would appreciate any insights to those who follow the Blackhawks more closely.

[SeaDawg]

I'm not at all worried. He's still the best dman on the team and his ice time will increase, as will his production.

[RevRath]

I own him in one league and it’s a little confusing but I’m not too worried either. I mean he was second on the team last season for TOI with 22+ minutes per game (and that increased in the last quarter). I just find it hard to believe he’ll suddenly be under 20 min/game going forward. He was still receiving the majority of PP minutes in those two games and was at 23-25 minutes in the first two.

If it continues for a couple weeks then I’d be more concerned.

[Auston'sWilly]

How is Gus defensively, for anyone who watches them regularly? I don't see any Hawks games, but when I see "best dman" I'm wondering if that means best fantasy dman, or is he really the Hawks best actual Dman overall ?

[red36]

I’m not concerned about the dip in toi but I do have a concern with how over hyped Gust is. In my opinion, last year was his career year and he wont touch 60pts ever again. I’m not even comfortable enough to say he will be a consistent 50 yet. He has to prove that and too many have just assumed he will. He is currently hyped like he had his 60pt season in his 23yr old season but in reality he is 27.

Last season he shot just over 10%, resulting in 17gs on 160sog. 160sog says he will drop below 10g this season. He also had multiple months of PPG (+ or - a point). February he had 17pts in 13gp. I dont see that as repeatable.

The TOI will soon bounce back up. He will finish somewhere between 40-50pts I think. Depending on your cost to acquire him, that may or may not be concerning

[Daydream Nation]

How is Gus defensively, for anyone who watches them regularly? I don't see any Hawks games, but when I see "best dman" I'm wondering if that means best fantasy dman, or is he really the Hawks best actual Dman overall ?

Gustafsson is a poor defensive player in his own zone. IMO his ideal role is the PP1 QB and on the 2nd or 3rd pair. He needs to be paired with a solid SAH dman since he pinches often. He consistently gets deeper than any player I have seen in Chicago in the last 10 years. He was never allowed to play this cowboy-style under Quennville. Last season, Gus was given freedom with the thinking that when you have Chicago's elite skill, you're willing to trade chances. It definitely produced offense but it gave up a tremendous amount of high quality shots.

In terms of his ice time, the last 2 games saw the Hawks get leads which reduced Gus's 5-on-5 time. The Gus/Keith pairing was terrible in terms of possession over the first 3 games and was split up. De Haan should be a much better partner for him. Overall, there is no threat to Gus's PP1 role but his stats would suffer if Colliton attempts to rein in his free-styling ways. Colliton recently said unprompted in a presser that he needs to choose to play better defensively (paraphrasing). We have never heard anything like that before about Gus's game from the coaching staff. It will be interesting over the next couple months. The odds of the Hawks resigning him increased with Debrincat taking a bridge deal but IMO the Hawks need more defensively-sound dmen.

[SeaDawg]

How is Gus defensively, for anyone who watches them regularly? I don't see any Hawks games, but when I see "best dman" I'm wondering if that means best fantasy dman, or is he really the Hawks best actual Dman overall ?

Maybe he isn't the team's best overall dman...poor choice of words for me. I should probably say "most valuable" dman. Truth is that the Chicago defense is a hot mess with the aging Keith and Seabrook, so as much as Gustafsson may not be the most defensively-sound dman, he isn't all that much more of a liability than most of the other Chicago dmen right now.

[Auston'sWilly]

Maybe he isn't the team's best overall dman...poor choice of words for me. I should probably say "most valuable" dman. Truth is that the Chicago defense is a hot mess with the aging Keith and Seabrook, so as much as Gustafsson may not be the most defensively-sound dman, he isn't all that much more of a liability than most of the other Chicago dmen right now.

Cool, thanks for the input on him. He's weirdly been one of my best fantasy performers for some time and I know so little about him.

[ericdaoust]

I'm not reacting in any way after just two games

[Daydream Nation]

Gus is now on the 3rd pairing. De Haan is now paired with Keith and Gus is with Slater Koekkoek Murphy is on LTIR for at least 3 weeks. This won’t affect Gus’s PP time but definitely his time at evens will decrease.

[RizzeeDizzee]

Same thing is happening with Keith Yandle - both will be fine

[Daydream Nation]

Same thing is happening with Keith Yandle - both will be fine

I am not so sure. I had him pegged at 60+ points but I would scale that back after seeing the start of the season. The PP looked awful last night and has not been as effective as last year. Plus, there has been a concerted effort to reduce high-scoring chances which would start with reining in Gus's game. If the Hawks continue to slide and look as if they won't make the playoffs, trading future UFA Gustafsson for a draft pick and promoting Boqvist is a great option. Most feel that Boqvist could run the PP as well as Gus right now and neither of them play any defense.