To be clear, I'm not saying McDavid or Draisaitl should be immune from criticism. Not at all.

I railed about 29's Dzone flyby's on Stauffer's show on Monday.

There's nothing wrong with the "5 foot view" to analyze who made mistakes on individual plays (1/

My issue is that if the conclusion is then "and EDM won't win until these guys learn to do this" or "and EDM won't win until they have their Yzerman moment", that's where my issue lies.

You can't focus on individual plays without also referencing the "50 ft view" (2/

Will it help if 97 and 29 get better without the puck? No question, but you can't forget where the team is with them today as they are.
(3/

Here are all the 5v5 goals scored for and against EDM this year. Separated into "McDavid On", "Draisaitl On", and "neither On" (4/

For the 14th year in the row, the depth on the Oilers is not good and gives away a lot (if not most/all) of what the top players produce. (2016/17 excepted)

It would be better if 97 & 29's GF% was in the high 50's, but a lot of that is on goaltending as well. (5/

McDavid got to the 60's (!) in 16/17, and the bottom 6 didn't give it all away.

Is it coincidence that was the year the Dcrops was healthy, Sekera was still here and Talbot had a great year?

No sir/ma'am it is not a coincidence. (6/

So did 97 and 29 "know how to win" then? Were they little Stevie Yzermans all over the ice?

No, they had a Dcorps playing well behind them, Letestu and Kassian carrying the bottom 6 and Talbot having a great year. (7/

It takes a team to win hockey games and every reporter mentions that "depth wins" during the playoffs hundreds of times.

I guess that's unless the team shits the bed, gets some back bounces and gets bad goaltending, then you can only blame the best players apparently. (8/8)