Photo credit: John E. Sokolowski-Imagn Images
It looks like Connor Dewar is doing just fine after moving on from the Maple Leafs and his season in Pittsburgh shows that the team may have lost a valuable piece.
With all the bodies coming in for the Maple Leafs over the past year, that means several players who may have been on the fringe or not necessarily everyday players were expendable.
One of those seemed to be Connor Dewar, who was packaged along with Conor Timmins and traded to the Pittsburgh Penguins in order to open up cap room for eventual roster players Brandon Carlo and Scott Laughton.
Connor Dewar a much better player than his Maple Leafs career suggests
Dewar never got much attention in Toronto but since coming to Pittsburgh it looks like Toronto may have missed out on someone who could have impacted the lineup — he just needed a shot.
Looking at Dewar’s stats this season, you can see that his even strength offense has improved significantly, he’s playing great defense, and he’s already tied his career high in points and goals.
Since coming to Pittsburgh last year, Dewar has 26 points in 65 games; not too shabby for a fourth liner. Plus he’s doing a bang up job defensively, isn’t taking many penalties and is throwing the body too with 131 hits.
Looking at it though, Dewar never was given a real shot to succeed. He played in 48 games total for Toronto, but had seasons of 74 and 81 games prior to that, and he’s already surpassed that total in Pittsburgh in less than a calendar year.
Why Toronto failed Connor Dewar
For a coach like Craig Berube, it’s a bit wild that he wouldn’t be able to utilize Dewar or bring out the player we’re seeing currently because he would have been a perfect addition to Toronto’s bottom-six this season.
Nearly half of Dewar’s time he was spent playing with names like David Kampf and Ryan Reaves. While Dewar was looked at as a fourth line player, how can you expect him to thrive with a tough group to play with.
Reaves and Kampf aren’t offensive and barely play, and by proxy since the team found no other place for him in the lineup he was scratched or had minimal minutes and while injuries played their part; he wasn’t that fragile.
He literally played 10 seconds more on average in Toronto than Minnesota, and has crushed that with a three-and-a-half minute increase under Mike Sullivan and Dan Muse — he’s been trusted as an NHL player and he’s repaying it with his production.
So it never was Connor Dewar’s fault that he couldn’t pick it up in Toronto, because he was really never given a chance to.
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Former Maple Leafs forward is breaking out after leaving Toronto
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