There's a reason that football coaches, harkening back to the time of leather helmets and twin-planted goalposts, have favored the run over the pass: It's one less thing that can go wrong.
Meet Mike Matheson. Who really should've been an old-school wing-T back.
This caught my eye from the PPG Paints Arena press box Tuesday night in the Penguins' 4-2 victory over the Rangers, and I couldn't help but share:
Like that?
The puck drifts across the Pittsburgh blue line, and New York's Brett Howden gives chase before Matheson outskates him, gains body position with the left shoulder and ... just when I'm certain he's going to do a routine hard wrap around the boards, he instead taps the puck ahead further to himself.
With that, he spots Colin Blackwell bearing down. Blackwell's thinking, like I am, that Matheson's still going to do a wrap, which is why Blackwell thrusts his body into the boards.
Only Matheson ... yowza, that's pretty. Like Alexei Kovalev pretty.
Dude can skate. Can stickhandle. Can keep his head up throughout. And yeah, this time, he can clear the zone.
Never overthink for a split-second why Jim Rutherford wanted this player and, ultimately, was willing to part with Patric Hornqvist to get him: The Penguins ranked 19th in zone-exit efficiency in 2019-20, bogged down by turnovers, a lack of mobility and ... well, more turnovers that resulted from that lack of mobility.
Last summer, after his team was spat out of the Stanley Cup playoffs in four games, as Rutherford was watching the Stars surprise many by reaching the Final, it didn't sound like they were any surprise to him. As J.R. told me at the time, "Watch their blue line. Watch how they move their feet, how they get the puck out." And I did watch, appreciating ever more the efficiency -- effortless at times in appearance -- of John Klingberg, Miro Heiskanen and Esa Lindell. They were so smooth, in fact, that they made an old-ish Dallas team look semi-fast.
Fast fact: 42% of all five-on-five goals happen within five seconds of the attacking team gaining the zone.
Faster fact: The sooner that puck's out, the better.
Fastest fact: These Penguins aren't any faster than those Stars.
Matheson isn't any of those Dallas defensemen, of course. Any GM anywhere would take Klingberg, Heiskanen or Lindell over Matheson. They're more poised, more polished, less prone to the mistakes that've plagued Matheson all through his time in Sunrise and now here.
But ...
For the same reason the star running back totes the ball 30 times a game, an athlete as gifted as Matheson gets valued because he ... you know, can do things. Because he's got the God-given ability to outpace his peers. He's stronger. He's faster. He's able to process his thoughts at the same speed he generates with his body.
That sequence up there, the whole thing, there's literally not another player on the Penguins' roster who can pull that off that isn't named Evgeni Malkin.
I've got another, same game, same period:
Like that one, too?
Man, there's the full-blown Wing-T.
The Penguins were fresh off a line change, but their defense pair was still stuck after a bit of a New York surge. Matheson looks up to see all three of the new forwards blanketed by the Rangers and, again eschewing the predictable play of simply whacking the puck somewhere toward center red, he curls back behind Tristan Jarry's net to lure Ryan Strome into tailing him back there.
The Rangers then seem to think he's in trouble, as the other two forwards pursue Matheson once Strome's forced him to take a side. All very much in vain, as he bursts into the neutral zone, dumps hard and bolts for the bench.
Which, of course, is where any Kovalev comparison dies since Kovalev would've stayed out another five minutes and tried to stickhandle through every Blueshirt in sight, but I digress.
Matheson's doing stuff most humans can't do. That's his schtick. That's why he's here.
Ask Mike Sullivan about this Matheson lapse or that Matheson gaffe, as I have more than once this season, and he'll casually respond with all of the positives Matheson brings, in addition to all the potential he and management -- presumably the new management, as well -- believe can still be culled. Matheson's no kid at age 27, but I'm told the Penguins' scouts and analytics people alike saw tons to like about what he'd be moving forward if he can manage some of the most modest adjustments imaginable.
Maybe he can't. But maybe he can.
Cases in point from the time fo the trade:
THE POINT HOCKEY
Talk about statistical violence. Check out the huge pluses of those first four categories, and then that fizzler with the fifth. He can score, he can move the puck up ice by passing or carrying, he can outskate anyone to a loose puck, and he's one of the very best in the game at battling for the 50/50s ... but he's also going to give it right back way too often.
Let me ask this: Of those five facets, which one would any hockey coach feel most strongly they could correct?
Mm-hm.
Wait, one more, also same game, same period:
Know the saying about how the puck follows players when they're hot?
This is the other way around.
Initially, Matheson's the trailer for a three-on-two that Bryan Rust can't convert. Immediately after, Matheson's the one who collects the puck in the right corner, casually defers to Sidney Crosby, dashes all the way across to the left point where he belongs, dekes Blackwell out of his red pants along the boards, slides behind to Jake Guentzel, retraces his steps to the left point, tries to feed Crosby for a tip, sets up again ... and all that in a span of a dozen seconds.
He'll drive people nuts. I won't deny that. But don't deny that it's worth learning a whole lot more.