Nathan MacKinnon says the Habs have one of the NHL's most underrated players.

It's always nice to hear high praise from your peer group, but that is even more true when the praise comes from someone in the very upper echelons of that group.

Colorado Avalanche superstar Nathan MacKinnon was a recent guest on the Spittin Chiclets podcast and as you would expect MacKinnon opined on a number of topics during the interview from video games and media to the sport of hockey and his home province of Nova Scotia, but there was one moment in particular during his appearance that stood out to me. MacKinnon was asked by co-host Paul "Biznasty" Bissonnette to name a player that he felt was particularly difficult to play against and rather than give a generic answer, like for example naming a superstar from another team, MacKinnon chose to go another route and instead opted to shout out someone he feels is among the league's underrated players.

MacKinnon's comments were about a player on the Montreal Canadiens roster but rather than being about some of the organizations more high profile names, names like Shea Weber, Carey Price, Nick Suzuki or even Jonathan Drouin, MacKinnon instead spoke of forward Phillip Danault.

"Yeah I think an underrated guy would be Phillip Danault in Montreal. I think he should.... I don't know if it's Selke recognition or not but he should. He's so hard to play against, he's such a good centerman man, he's all over me man every time we play Montreal home or away. I find it's definitely really hard to get space against him, and hopefully he earns a Selke one day I think he deserves it. I think he's good against everybody not just me."

That is incredibly high praise from one of the National Hockey League's most gifted players especially when you consider the kind of names that do get recognized for the Selke each and every season. The mention of the Selke would indicate to me that MacKinnon's focus here is on the the defensive game from the Habs centerman, but despite that two way playstyle Danault is having himself a solid offensive start to the season. Through 5 games with the Canadiens thus far he has accumulated 3 points and is a plus minus of +2 on the season.