Is Connor Brown emerging as an 'untouchable' for the Leafs?

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Published 6 years ago
Is Connor Brown emerging as an 'untouchable' for the Leafs?
Keystone Press Agency

Connor Brown is making it harder and harder for Toronto Maple Leafs brass to put him on the back end of the depth chart.

This fall has been a coming out of sorts for the 23-year-old jack-of-all-trades (as if 2016-17 wasn't a sure enough sign). And NHL media are slowly creeping towards a legitimate question: is Brown inching himself towards "untouchable" territory alongside Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and (arguably) Morgan Reilly?

TSN 1050 host Bryan Hayes argued that Brown has already asserted himself as the Leafs' "fifth guy," and would be part of "twenty to 25 other teams' top four."

"He's really one of my favourite players," said former NHLer and NBCSN commentator Ray Ferraro. 

"I didn't really know a lot about him... I had no idea that he was this good. He just kinda is good. I don't even really know why he is. He just is. He's not super-fast, he doesn't have a great shot, he's just really smart and he really knows how to play. There's nothing deficient in his game, there's nothing that stands out and he's just good. Kid's a hell of a player."

TSN's head of scouting and former Dallas Stars exec Craig Button also chimed in:

"He reminds me in the way he plays, how he fixes everything, to the way Jere Lehtinen played. They didn't race up and down the ice but when you talk about 'not deficient' and really smart, that's Connor Brown."

"[Former Dallas Stars head coach Dave] Tippett used to call Lehtinen his 'janitor,'" said Ferraro. "And whenever there was a mess he'd put Lehtinen on that line to kind of clean things up. It really looks like that's the way that [Mike] Babcock uses Brown."

Following a rookie season in which he recorded 20 goals while suiting up in all 82 regular season games, Brown is well on pace to shatter that number, noted the Globe and Mail. He has seven goals through the first 20 games of the season despite starting the 2017-18 campaign on the team's fourth line, where even-strength minutes are scarce.

Brown opened the season on the fourth line for the team's first five regular-season games before he was moved up in favour of fellow sophomore Mitch Marner, who struggled with the defensive element of his game.

"You just can't overthink it with whatever line your on," Brown told the Globe and Mail. "I think for me, I understand that me switching lines isn't necessarily about how I'm playing every night. You just have to stick with what you bring."

According to Babcock, it's Brown's mentality that allows him to seamlessly switch between lines. Talk about a "jack of all trades."

"The thing about it, is he's mentally tough enough that it doesn't even bother him," Babcock said.

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Source: TSN 1050