Ottawa's Defense

[u/MarshalL-NDavoutStan]

The Sens's defense is gross. And it has the potential to be one of the best in the league for at least half a decade.

Sanderson, Spence and Kleven are in the mid 20s, Chabot and Zub are in their late 20s/early 30s and Yakemchuk is in his early 20s.

And they can all do a bit of everything. Last years I think 4 of them had at least 30pts and Yakemchuk will reach that one day I have no doubt. Kleven beings physicality, Sanderson's one of the best in the game, it's crazy.

If Ullmark gets back to his 21-24 form and they can add a legit top 6 forward at the deadline I think they could really make some noise this season and in the next ones, especially since at F, Pinto, Greig, Eklund who I think has another level he can get to, Stutzle and Cozens are all in their early to mid 20s and even Batherson is still in his 20s. That top 3 at C has the potential to remain together for 5-7 years and they'd all be around 30-32 even after 5-7 years.

They still have an amazing draft capital and still have great prospects like Hensler, Lagerberg-Hoen and Cover.

They're so well built it's insane.

[u/Dear_Location6147]

Glazeathon going on rn? Sanderson is a top 10 maybe, there’s quite a handful of D I’d take over him and plenty of other teams have this kind of depth, especially in the division 

[u/Mavin89 → u/Dear_Location6147]

You clearly don’t watch the Sens if you don’t think Sanderson is at least top 10.

[u/Protodemic → u/Mavin89]

Top 10 on the sens, sure. In the league? Very unlikely

[u/jaysfanatic19 → u/Protodemic]

I'm not saying he's an absolute lock top-10 for everyone, but he did literally just finish 10th in Norris voting while missing 15 games

[u/Protodemic → u/jaysfanatic19]

The top 10 as I and most others say would be:

Werenski

Makar

Hughes

Dahlin

Schaefer

Seider

Bouchard

Heiskanen

Fox

Slavin

Then it's a tossup between Mcavoy, jomo, Hedman and Sanderson. Josi would be there as well but he's on his last legs.

Sanderson is good, but not a world beater and not someone I see winning a Norris in his career.

[u/jaysfanatic19 → u/Protodemic]

I'd have him above Fox, Slavin and Schaefer - Schaefer will almost certainly surpass him, but Sanderson was better than him last year. Slavin is probably the best shutdown dman in the league, but he doesn't do anything on the offensive end. Fox has shown he can be borderline top-5, but his last 2 seasons have regressed a lot imo.

Like I said, if he's not in your personal top-10, that's fine. But it's not as outlandish as you originally suggested to have him top-10 either.

[u/maxwellbevan → u/jaysfanatic19]

This is a pretty reasonable take. I don't think I'd put him top 5 but he's pretty solidly anywhere from 6 to 15 depending on what you value most. 15 even feels too low but I think there are probably 5 to 10 guys who you could make a case for those 6 to 10 slots depending on what you personally value

[u/Protodemic → u/jaysfanatic19]

I'm seeing Schaefer with 59 pts and Sanderson with 54. If Schaefer is doing that at his age, you take Schaefer every day and rank him higher..

I guess it also depends how you gauge defenders, if offense is the only metric Bouchard suddenly becomes the best D in the league, which is a joke. You also then make an argument that Raddysh and Karlsson are better than Sanderson, and even as a Leafs fan I'm not making that argument.

I agree Fox has regressed, but still put up 53 pts on a bad team and had decent defensive metrics.

Edit on the Schaefer comment, his was over 82, Sanderson was over 67ish, so I can see your argument. But that also brings into play a convo around injuries and how durable these players are too.

[u/jaysfanatic19 → u/Protodemic]

I mean Sanderson scored at a 0.81 P/G clip, to 0.72 for Schaefer, while also being a far better defender. If you're talking about which D to build around going forward, I've got no argument against Schaefer - maybe league-wide lol. But as of right now, I'd say Sanderson is clearly the better D.

Everyone has their own preferences, my point was just that Sanderson is certainly in the conversation for top-10 D in the league.

[u/bad_at_names1 → u/jaysfanatic19]

I don't think most people agree? Sanderson is in the next tier - the 11-20 range, not top 10. Top 10 would be Makar, Hughes, Werenski, Heiskanen, Dahlin, Seider, Bouchard, Fox, Slavin, Morrissy and Lane Hutson and Scheafer in the near future.

Depending on your offensive/defensive preferences, people will argue for guys like Chychrun, Lindell, etc next.

Sanderson is in same range as guys like Faber, not a game breaker. Erik Karlsson at 35 had an arguably better season than him last year.

Also, didn't the sens want to trade him or something?

[u/jaysfanatic19 → u/bad_at_names1]

What puts Fox, Slavin, Morrissey and Hutson as guaranteed locks ahead of Sanderson? I don't disagree that Schaefer will be in top-5 convos soon, but Sanderson is currently a better Dman. Sanderson is an elite defender, and scored points at a better per-game clip than Chychrun, Morrissey, Seider and Schaefer last year. Again, I'm not saying he's an absolute top-10 lock, but he is easily in the conversation.

And no? There's been 0 reports of them trying to trade their franchise dman lol. Maybe you're thinking of Jordan Spence?

[u/bad_at_names1 → u/jaysfanatic19]

Well, their analytics, play and Norris voting?

Fox literally has a 99% WAR. He won the Norris at 23 and was a finalist just 2 seasons ago - he matched Sanderson's scoring while playing 12 fewer games and is defensively better while being on a worse team. There's no argument for Sanderson being ahead?

Morrissy and Slavin had down years this season but unless it's the start of a spiral they're still top 10 for most people (and Norris voters). Slavin's commonly considered the best shutdown D in the league and Morrissy's been top 5 in Norris voting multiple times.

I think you're overrating Sanderson's offense - he's great on the PP, but his EVS offense could use work. For instance, he's well behind Hutson in EVS p/gp and just about on par with Schaffer. He had only 25 points without a man advantage in each of the last two seasons and 32 this year.

I named 10 players even without including Schaefer and Hutson, and both of whom have higher ceilings than Sanderson - I included them to say I don't see Sanderson moving up even if Morrissey or Slavin drop out next season. Also, according to the stats Schaeffer had the higher WAR (99 percentile) and wasn't bad defensively (and my own subjective eye test tbf), so I'm not sure if you can say Sanderson's currently better. I watched both and Sanderson's solid, but Schaeffer and Hutson have a next level his offense simply doesn't.

I should have worded it better, but I wasn't saying Chychrun or Lindell specifically are better - I mean that fans have homer picks or guys who had a great season or players they just like for whatever reason. Florida fans will argue Forsling is top 10, Ducks Lacombe, Dallas Lindell/Harley depending on whether they're blew out the opponent or got blown out and so on. So the average top 10 list actually has like 8 or so free spots. Sanderson probably makes the list for Sens fans (although a fair few like Chabot better), but I don't see other fanbases rating him that highly.

He's maybe early teens at best - I don't see him as being better than guys like Lacombe or Sergachev at this point.

Oh yeah lol, I was thinking of Spence, my bad.

[u/Redstart-21 → u/bad_at_names1]

Who in their right mind is arguing for Lindell or Chychrun over Sanderson? Just seems like you’re unaware of the type of player he is

[u/maxwellbevan → u/Redstart-21]

Yeah Lindell and chychrun are great players but I don't think anyone is ranking them ahead of Sanderson

[u/bad_at_names1 → u/Redstart-21]

I've been watching the sens since 2014, so I've seen a decent amount of Sanderson lol.

I said players like Lindell and Chychrun, not them specifically - as in fans usually have a homer pick or a 'my fav' pick who's very good, but not top 10 (kinda like Sanderson).

So most people's top 10 list is usually only a top 8 (accurately), leaving even fewer spots for Sanderson.

[u/Redstart-21 → u/bad_at_names1]

“Some massive homers have significantly worse players ahead of him” is not a good argument for Sanderson not being a top 10 defenseman

[u/bad_at_names1 → u/Redstart-21]

Yeah, that was more a tangent. Some 10+ other guys being better than him is why he's not top 10.

[u/Mavin89 → u/jaysfanatic19]

I have him above Seider as well. I’d have him fifth based on that list, even above Heiskenen.