The New Jersey Devils have seen their star left wing grow into one of the best players in the NHL, but an injury has set him way back in the minds of the national media.
The New Jersey Devils absolutely robbed the Edmonton Oilers when they traded Adam Larsson for Taylor Hall. Since the trade, Hall developed into one of the best players in the NHL as he has won the Hart Trophy as league MVP and turned into the face of the Devils. On Sunday night, the NHL Network released their “Top-20 Wing” list and it wasn’t as kind to Hall as it was last year.
Last year, as the defending Hart Trophy winner, he was ranked third on the list. This year, he was ranked 15th. 15th is good, but Hall should be much higher. The likely reason that he dropped so far is that he missed most of the season. He only played in 33 games for the Devils this season. He had 37 points in those 33 games which are a 92 point pace over 82 games. One less point than when he won the Hart Trophy one year prior.
It makes sense that he isn’t third again, but to drop him that many spots is completely ridiculous. He got hurt, and that caused him to be out for a long time, but to say that because of that you would rather have 14 wingers above him is crazy. He is one of the most skilled wingers in the game and drives offense in the way most elite centers do. It is hard for wingers to impact the game on their own as much as Hall does which is why this list is a little weird.
Chances are, if Hall is healthy in 2019-20, he will be much higher on the list by this time next year. The NHL Network has not been shy about giving Hall praise and it is clear that recency bias has a lot to do with these top players lists. Hopefully, Hall can have a great year and raises his stock back up to where his talent deserves to be.
These lists are meant for debate and really don’t mean much, but our guy just seems to be a bit disrespected. Hall is entering a contract year so you can expect him to come into this season very motivated and that could be really bad news for the rest of the NHL. It isn’t a bad thing to be anywhere on this list because every player on it is elite and their teams would be worse off without them.