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Is Pettersson Olli Maatta 2.0? |
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The all star break has gone well for Marcus Pettersson.
The 4.025M AAV is very close to the 4.033M contract Olli Maatta received back in the day. Much like Olli Maatta, Pettersson did a good job in his first season with the team. Both players found themselves in a third pairing role in their Penguins debut season. The biggest difference is Pettersson had to do it with Erik Gudbranson and Jack Johnson and Maatta had the luxury of playing with Matt Niskanen. Olli Maatta came hot out of the gate with a 5v5 points per 60 of 1.01 his first year with the Penguins. Marcus Pettersson was lower at 0.75. Both players were 50-51% in their shot attempt share. The thing to remember is the Niskanen factor. Olli Maatta’s perception was heavily influenced by this. Sure, injuries, cancer, and mumps played into the Maatta saga over the years, but Maatta petered out and was never the player the Penguins hoped he was going to be. The perceptions and expectations were shaped by a year in which Maatta was sheltered with a legitimately good partner.
Here are Pettersson’s first two seasons with the team
When we look at the comparison between season one and season two with the Penguins there are a lot of similarities. His offense is similar and some of the other underlying numbers have marginally improved. Some differences are his ice time is up and his quality of teammate is up. He is putting up similarly acceptable numbers even with those changes.
Two things I do want to look at are his time on ice against elite players and his offensive zone starts. The time against great players is still low. Kris Letang’s pairing is still absorbing all the tough minutes. This makes life a lot easier for everybody else playing below them on the depth chart. Also, his offensive zone starts have gone up considerably. I don’t hold either of these things against Pettersson. I do think this context is necessary to keep expectations reasonable and not get carried away like people did with Olli Maatta.
Pettersson is likely a mid-pairing defender who can do good things when not playing against all the other team’s best players. He can chip in offensively and make some good passes on the breakout. The 4.025M cap hit is very reasonable for the role he will be asked to play. I don’t forecast him to be able to take on an elevated role unless his other partner is someone like Kris Letang. Ideally, the Penguins won’t ever have to ask him to do that. I think a Dumoulin-Letang and Pettersson-Marino top four will be a good foundation for the Penguins defense grouping the next couple of years. It isn’t the best in the league, far from the worst, and better than average. This is one less thing the team will have to worry about moving forward and that is good.
Thanks for reading!
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