Dallas Stars: Last Year’s Grade, Next Year’s Guess: Tyler Seguin

In the penultimate edition of our Dallas Stars player grades, it’s time to take a look at Tyler Seguin.

Seguin’s future with the Dallas Stars may be in question, but he had a fantastic year last season and it’s understandable if he wants to get paid and be on a team that’s contending.

Last Season

Tyler Seguin’s 2017-18 Grade: A

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After getting close with a pair of 37-goal seasons, Seguin had his first 40-goal season in 2017-18. He led the offense pretty consistently throughout the season while also improving defensively.

Seguin’s 2.6 defensive point share was the highest of his career and a marked improvement over his 0.9 from the 2016-17 season. Part of that came from adjusting to Ken Hitchcock’s system, which will be gone again this fall, but if he can carry some of his defensive game into the new season, he’ll be a more well-rounded player.

Another change for Seguin last year was his penalty kill minutes. Under Lindy Ruff’s tenure, he didn’t play when the team was shorthanded, but Hitchcock gave Seguin a chance and expected him to play both sides of the special teams. It was clear Seguin wasn’t used to playing on the penalty kill, but he did a decent job of adjusting to it through the season.

Offensively, Seguin had one of the best years of his career, and he took some big steps forward in his two-way game, so an A is an easy grade to hand out to him.

Not factored into the grade but still an amusing note on his season, Seguin finally got into his first NHL fight as well. It was against former Stars defenseman Patrik Nemeth and it contributed to Seguin not getting a single Lady Byng vote for the first time since coming to Dallas.

Next Season

Seguin’s play this fall isn’t much of a concern to fans right now in the wake of something more pressing: his contract.

It’s been discussed to death in the media all summer, but it will continue to loom over the Stars until a deal gets made. It happened with the Lightning and Steven Stamkos, it happened with the Islanders and John Tavares, and now it’s happening with the Stars and Seguin. Erik Karlsson’s situation with the Senators falls into a similar boat, and the Stars appear to be caught in the middle of both Seguin and Karlsson’s potential deals for the foreseeable future. It’s certainly going to put a lot of strain on the team, but hopefully it won’t impact their play.

Realistically, Seguin should be able to come out and have another great year where he continues to build his case for a high contract, but his case is already made for him at this point. He’s unquestionably a major asset to the team, and Nill needs to do anything in his power to get a deal done quickly if he can.

Unfortunately for fans who’d rather just watch the game than worry about this sort of stuff, it looks like we’ll all be buckling in for a long season of wondering what’s going to happen.

Stop back tomorrow for the last of the grades for returning Dallas Stars players. If you haven’t been keeping track, we’re down to just John Klingberg now, and his grade should come as no surprise to fans.