Mammoth’s Clayton Keller is one of the NHL’s most underrated players

Even as the Utah Mammoth have moved on from their time as the Arizona Coyotes, and are starting to become a bigger franchise and have a bigger following, Clayton Keller continues to be overlooked among the best players in the league. His 315 points in the last four seasons ranks 23rd in the league in that span, and yet he still falls under the radar in the league, including USA Hockey.

Cole Bagley of KSL Sports joined Daily Faceoff Live this week to talk about Keller and how he continues to not get as much attention as he should.

Cole Bagley: I think he’s right up there. There was a post on X/Twitter last week from BarDown that had this bar where it was skill way up here and recognition way down here. And I quoted that and I put that I think it’s Clayton Keller.

It’s not just because he’s here in Utah and plays for the team that I cover. But I genuinely think you look at a guy that had 90 points to this last season, who helped lead the United States to a gold medal for the first time in 93 years at World Championships. He’s the youngest captain in the league, and it just feels like nobody’s ever really talking about it. He’s doing all these incredible things, and I think he is one of the most underrated players in the National Hockey League.

He downplayed the fact that he was left off [the United States] 4-Nations [team]. Any time you’d ask him about it, he’d say it doesn’t really matter. I think he took it personally, because he exploded from that point with an unbelievable performance throughout the rest of the season.

Every time he played the Minnesota Wild, they were generally beating the Wild, and Keller was at the forefront of that. He averaged 2.25 points every time they played Minnesota after this. He was letting Bill Guerin know he made a mistake leaving Keller off the roster. And I do expect him to make the Olympic roster after the season he had, and what he did at the World Championships. He would be a massive snub if he is left off.

You can watch the full episode here…