Joined: Jul. 2018
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It's hard to compare those 2 players because Matthews hasn't been on the top line for a while because of Tavares. Eichel has played against top units all the time so that works in his favor.
But I wouldn't say Eichel has had terrible linemates all the time as he played with Skinner, an elite ES goalscorer over the past years (yeah I know he's not good this year and has some big downsides to his game), Reinhart who is pretty good and Olofsson who's a good goalscorer as well. Matthews hasn't had the most impressive linemates. He hasn't played a lot with Marner. Instead he got linemates like Hyman, Kapanen, Johnsson and Nylander who hasn't or hadn't proven anything before playing with Matthews. And the thing is: all of those have played good along Matthews. But when they were on a different line, players didn't reached the same level. Hyman, Kapanen, Johnsson and even Nylander has been up and down the line-up for a while when not playing with Matthews. And now Hyman and Nylander are back on the Matthews line. For some reason the Matthews line has always been productive, while centers like Kadri and now Tavares kinda needs Marner on the wing because of lacking chemistry with others. I'd say it's fair to assume Matthews makes his teammates look better.
Matthews is the best 5v5 goalscorer since entering the league and he improves the game of his linemates. And don't forget that Matthews (and any forward at Toronto) has rarely played over 20 minutes a game in his career until the coaching change which affects his points total. Eichel might be the most complete player of the two, but I'd pick Matthews over Eichel every single time