2024/2025 Statistical Projections [Team and Players]

[conFABulator]

If we want to believe that past results are an indicator for future performance then it looks like we have a pretty good hockey team on our hands here. I ran a pretty basic projection model by doing the following:

• Configured lines and pairings to allocate minutes (ES, PP, SH)
• Forecasted approximately 210 man-games-lost-to-injury and distributed those across F (117), D (80) and G (20) pretty evenly though I did give the older guys more than the younger guys.
• Lost games were filled by Reaves, Grebyebkin, Steeves, Minten, Cowan, Timmins, Hakanpaa, and Murray
• With GP and minutes in place, I projected everyone based on last year's actual per-minute performance. I used Dewar's Minnesota result, Tanev's Dallas, and Murray's 2022-23. For the kids and call-ups, I just pegged them to others. I had Cowan perform as Minten did in his 9-game call-up, and Minten will put up Holmberg-like results, Grebyonkin-like Robertson, etc. This was somewhat arbitrary but has little bottom-line impact due to their small sample sizes.
• I did not mess with any of the results, for example, Holmberg should get better results on a line with Nylander and Marner, I also didn't forecast growth and improvement from guys like Knies, McMann, Robertson, Woll, or Liljegren as those might be offset by declines from Tavares, Rielly, OEL, etc. I did lower the SA per game from 29.84 to 29. We did add some strong dmen and have a new coach.
• I just used last year's SH goals and ENG as projecting them was not something I could easily figure out a simple model for.

With all of this, our team projects to score 293 goals while allowing 217 for a +76 projected goal differential. That is eight better than anyone had last year and 36 better than we had.

So, are we the best team in the NHL? Are we that improved? Note, that these are not MY PREDICTIONS, these are what the data tells us will happen based on historical data and the assumptions above. What's the flaw in the model?

Click to read more...

 

[notbias]

Everyone plays bad and is injured? I don't think that'll happen.

 

[conFABulator]

Everyone plays bad and is injured? I don't think that'll happen.

How did you get that from this?

At least you didn't just put a "grinning idiot" emoji on it like a couple of others (so far) did. What does that even mean? I am asking for input as to where the model would be off.

I imagine some of the hater crowd wants to hate it but doesn't have the words or analytical abilities to say why.

 

[HockeyVirus]

Woll putting up a .907 would be really bad. We need to see that putting up with his injuries is worth it.

 

[hamzarocks]

Everyone plays bad and is injured? I don't think that'll happen.

Matthews on pace for 109 per 82 vs 107 in 81 this year

Marner on pace for 99 pts in 82 vs 101 per 82 pace this year (85 in 69 he had)

Nylander on pace for 94 pts in 82 and had 98 in 82 this year

Domi jumps from 47 in 82 to 55 in 70 (monster year projected)

Knies, Robertson, Bobby McMann all jump quite big time

The only guys who noticably fall are Tavares who is expected as he becomes even more washed

And

Rielly which may be due to losing/splitting PP time with OEL.

poster is predicting injuries sure but per 82 if you assume minimal injuries the predictions/projections are pretty realistic

How did you get that from this?

At least you didn't just put a "grinning idiot" emoji on it like a couple of others (so far) did. What does that even mean? I am asking for input as to where the model would be off.

I imagine some of the hater crowd wants to hate it but doesn't have the words or analytical abilities to say why.

To many injuries tbh

Per 82 paces are pretty solid

But I cant see so much injuries to the forwards and D. No one playing 75+ games doesnt happen on the leafs.

Timmins i doubt plays more than 10 games as we likely are mostly healthy on the backend besides maybe 10-15 games of tanev

 

[conFABulator]

Matthews on pace for 109 per 82 vs 107 in 81 this year

Marner on pace for 99 pts in 82 vs 101 per 82 pace this year (85 in 69 he had)

Nylander on pace for 94 pts in 82 and had 98 in 82 this year

Domi jumps from 47 in 82 to 55 in 70 (monster year projected)

Knies, Robertson, Bobby McMann all jump quite big time

The only guys who noticably fall are Tavares who is expected as he becomes even more washed

And

Rielly which may be due to losing/splitting PP time with OEL.

poster is predicting injuries sure but per 82 if you assume minimal injuries the predictions/projections are pretty realistic


To many injuries tbh

Per 82 paces are pretty solid

But I cant see so much injuries to the forwards and D. No one playing 75+ games doesnt happen on the leafs.

Timmins i doubt plays more than 10 games as we likely are mostly healthy on the backend besides maybe 10-15 games of tanev

Thanks. The 82 game paces are literally taking last year's ES and PP per minute paces, the slight discrepancy you note probably has to do with a few SH points I didn't allocate to anyone. I just added 6 SH goals to the team total.

As for injuries. The Leafs lost around 400 games to injury last year but this must have included Klingberg and Murray. When I added it up on a player by player basis of actual players it was around 150 games.i bumped it to 200+ and spread it across the team. I agree that no one above 75 games will not happen, I just don't know which guys will actually get hurt.

Your projections above seem higher than what most did last year, and you have them being healthier. Are you projecting a ~+100 goal differential? That would have been about 50% higher than what led the NHL last year. When the Bruins had the best season ever they were +128.

If I understand your comments and suggestions, you feel they will do better than the projections my model produced. Thanks.

 

[notbias]

Matthews on pace for 109 per 82 vs 107 in 81 this year

Marner on pace for 99 pts in 82 vs 101 per 82 pace this year (85 in 69 he had)

Nylander on pace for 94 pts in 82 and had 98 in 82 this year

Domi jumps from 47 in 82 to 55 in 70 (monster year projected)

Knies, Robertson, Bobby McMann all jump quite big time

The only guys who noticably fall are Tavares who is expected as he becomes even more washed

And

Rielly which may be due to losing/splitting PP time with OEL.

poster is predicting injuries sure but per 82 if you assume minimal injuries the predictions/projections are pretty realistic


To many injuries tbh

Per 82 paces are pretty solid

But I cant see so much injuries to the forwards and D. No one playing 75+ games doesnt happen on the leafs.

Timmins i doubt plays more than 10 games as we likely are mostly healthy on the backend besides maybe 10-15 games of tanev

Tavares isn't dropping that much, his sh% was down, his ESP was up, he is not falling off a cliff no matter how much people want him to.

The ice-time is terrible, Knies and Domi are not playing more than Nylander, Marner, and Tavares.

Games played is not good.

Greb is somehow getting 16 pts in 34 gp and Jarnkrok is getting 9 in 55.

Numbers are just all over the place.

 

[hamzarocks]

Tavares isn't dropping that much, his sh% was down, his ESP was up, he is not falling off a cliff no matter how much people want him to.

The ice-time is terrible, Knies and Domi are not playing more than Nylander, Marner, and Tavares.

Games played is not good.

Greb is somehow getting 16 pts in 34 gp and Jarnkrok is getting 9 in 55.

Numbers are just all over the place.

Tavares was absolutely falling off a cliff

He had increased ESP due to his 2022-2023 year being bad from ESP but made up with 40 pp pts or so

This year, he relied on nylander being a hart level player to be around 75 pt llater, once that fizzled down, tavares production dropped like a rock

50-55 pts per 82 in the next year for Tavares is the most reasonable projection. He cant generate plays as a center any more and his finishing is done reducing his ability for PP goal conversions

The gap in TOI for Domi + Knied if they play the whole year on L1 with matthews vs WN and MM will be smaller this year by a lot with Berube likely to run proper lines and use the season to get matthews chemistry with Domi and Knies

Sure I still expect WN and MM to play a bit more on EVS but its not crazy to expect all 4 to play 15ish ES mins next year

agree that Greb projection is too high, cut his games by 20 and his points by 8 and give those to Jarnkrok and thats more realistic 17 in 55 for jarnkrok who had a bad year this year and is injury prone and declining.

The 3 main players got reasonable outputs and the depth was noted to improve production heavily

I cant see how this makes it seem like everyone got worse and will fall off when Robertson, McMann, Domi, Knies, Holmberg will all be projected for career highs in pts, and ppg (domi second best after his 72 pt year in mtl)

 

[notbias]

Tavares was absolutely falling off a cliff

This is wishful thinking, not reality.

He had increased ESP due to his 2022-2023 year being bad from ESP but made up with 40 pp pts or so

His production is not dropping that much... keep praying.

This year, he relied on nylander being a hart level player to be around 75 pt llater, once that fizzled down, tavares production dropped like a rock

His PPP dropped, and his ESP increased.

Maybe Tavares helped him with that career year and will play beside him again.

50-55 pts per 82 in the next year for Tavares is the most reasonable projection. He cant generate plays as a center any more and his finishing is done reducing his ability for PP goal conversions

Nope.

The gap in TOI for Domi + Knied if they play the whole year on L1 with matthews vs WN and MM will be smaller this year by a lot with Berube likely to run proper lines and use the season to get matthews chemistry with Domi and Knies

Berube should be fired immediately if he plays them more than Nylander, Marner, and Tavares.

Sure I still expect WN and MM to play a bit more on EVS but its not crazy to expect all 4 to play 15ish ES mins next year

A bit more? Knies and Domi are not on their level, not even close.

I cant see how this makes it seem like everyone got worse and will fall off when Robertson, McMann, Domi, Knies, Holmberg will all be projected for career highs in pts, and ppg (domi second best after his 72 pt year in mtl)

There is no logic around the ice time, games played, or production.

The method for all this work was take last years total, guess games played, guess ice time and then multiply.

 

[conFABulator]

Tavares isn't dropping that much, his sh% was down, his ESP was up, he is not falling off a cliff no matter how much people want him to.

The ice-time is terrible, Knies and Domi are not playing more than Nylander, Marner, and Tavares.

Games played is not good.

Greb is somehow getting 16 pts in 34 gp and Jarnkrok is getting 9 in 55.

Numbers are just all over the place.

The lineup is one that I believe is more in line with the Berube approach of balance and depth. If we run the numbers as I did they still score over 300 goals and have it spread out a bit more, which should be the goal in preparation for the playoffs.

JT drops to the third line and sees less PP time, both of which we should be considering as he ages. His stats are very good for a 3C, which is what he is in this model.

You're correct, Knies and Domi are not getting more ice time than Marner or Nylander. 34, 16, and 88 are the top three forwards in ice time in this model. You must have been looking at the ES minutes and didn't add PP or SH. They do get more ice time than Tavares which I think is fair.

GP is just allowing for injury and sharing it across all players instead of guessing which players might actually get hurt. If you have a better way, LMK.

Grebyenkin is just pegged against what Robertson did for us last year. That seemed reasonable and I don't know enough about Grebyenkin's game to support that comparison statistically.

Jarnkrok gets his ES ice time reduced to open up time for Robertson and Holmberg. Again, seemed reasonable to me. Calle gets some PK time too but that won't drive point production.

 

[notbias]

The lineup is one that I believe is more in line with the Berube approach of balance and depth. If we run the numbers as I did they still score over 300 goals and have it spread out a bit more, which should be the goal in preparation for the playoffs.

What makes you think Berube runs balanced lines?

JT drops to the third line and sees less PP time, both of which we should be considering as he ages. His stats are very good for a 3C, which is what he is in this model.

JT is better than everyone but Matthews, Marner, and Nylander.

You're correct, Knies and Domi are not getting more ice time than Marner or Nylander. 34, 16, and 88 are the top three forwards in ice time in this model. You must have been looking at the ES minutes and didn't add PP or SH. They do get more ice time than Tavares which I think is fair.

Let me rephrase, that they are not getting more ES ice time.

GP is just allowing for injury and sharing it across all players instead of guessing which players might actually get hurt. If you have a better way, LMK.

Look at who actually gets hurt and who doesn't... Over the last 3 years Tavares has missed a total of 7 games and is missing 17 this season...

Grebyenkin is just pegged against what Robertson did for us last year. That seemed reasonable and I don't know enough about Grebyenkin's game to support that comparison statistically.

Robertson > Greb.

Jarnkrok gets his ES ice time reduced to open up time for Robertson and Holmberg. Again, seemed reasonable to me. Calle gets some PK time too but that won't drive point production.

I don't see a world where Jarnkrok plays that little.

 

[conFABulator]

What makes you think Berube runs balanced lines?



JT is better than everyone but Matthews, Marner, and Nylander.



Let me rephrase, that they are not getting more ES ice time.



Look at who actually gets hurt and who doesn't... Over the last 3 years Tavares has missed a total of 7 games and is missing 17 this season...



Robertson > Greb.



I don't see a world where Jarnkrok plays that little.

I have read Berube's comments and comments about him. Maybe it doesn't play out this way. It does line up with the minutes he gave his top nine the past few years in STL.

I think we have done this dance before. You are good at seeing things you don't like, but not great at sharing or making clear the alternatives.

You have four lines, 12 forwards and roughly 48 ES minutes (plus 6 PP and 6 SH). How do you see those distributed? How many GP for each of them?

The point of this post wasn't HOW the Leafs should be configured but more about how solid this team projects to be. Maybe your configuration will get differ by results? Give me your minute allocations and I can run it through the model very quickly.

 

[conFABulator]

Woll putting up a .907 would be really bad. We need to see that putting up with his injuries is worth it.

That's a good example of a player improving and I agree. I didn't want this to be a bunch of my "opinions" for how players will improve or decline.

Woll was .907 last year so that is what is in this model. He may be higher, do we see Stolarz staying at .925 all year? Probably not, but that is what is in here. He probably declines and maybe Woll improves.

Also the average save percentage in the NHL last year was .903

 

[Aashir Mallik]

Most models tend to underestimate point productions

Take Marner, Someone who hasn’t had a pace of under 93 points since 2018-19 and he has 88 here

I’d also be shocked if Tavares had less points than both domi and knies

Also it sounds like you are running Marner nylander holmberg on a line together and yea I doubt he’d only get 25 points on the line. My complete guess would be 35-45.

I wonder how this model would spew out stats for mcdavid, draisaitl, kucherov, Mackinnon. If those guys are at 100-110 then I think the model is fine in terms of it just underestimates players scoring by around 10-20 points

Edit: I’m an idiot, didn’t see the games played lol

In terms of production in that case, I’d say it’s actually pretty good, most of my points are addressed by just looking at pace, I thought that was total points

Only thing I find weird is the amount of injuries/missed games. Nylander for example has missed 1 game the past 3 years, he misses 9 just here. No one even touches 80 let alone all 82 which is a bit weird. Also I have a feeling woll plays more than 35 games. I’m looking more at 40-45.

 

[RunItBackAgain]

JT is better than everyone but Matthews, Marner, and Nylander.

wishful thinking indeed…

 

[Evilhomer]

I think most of these numbers are understated, in some cases by quite a bit (like Tavares). Woll's numbers will also be far better. He will be at least .915.

 

[conFABulator]

Most models tend to underestimate point productions

Take Marner, Someone who hasn’t had a pace of under 93 points since 2018-19 and he has 88 here

I’d also be shocked if Tavares had less points than both domi and knies

Also it sounds like you are running Marner nylander holmberg on a line together and yea I doubt he’d only get 25 points on the line. My complete guess would be 35-45.

I wonder how this model would spew out stats for mcdavid, draisaitl, kucherov, Mackinnon. If those guys are at 100-110 then I think the model is fine in terms of it just underestimates players scoring by around 10-20 points

Edit: I’m an idiot, didn’t see the games played lol

In terms of production in that case, I’d say it’s actually pretty good, most of my points are addressed by just looking at pace, I thought that was total points

Only thing I find weird is the amount of injuries/missed games. Nylander for example has missed 1 game the past 3 years, he misses 9 just here. No one even touches 80 let alone all 82 which is a bit weird. Also I have a feeling woll plays more than 35 games. I’m looking more at 40-45.

Thanks, yeah it is the injuries that I didn't know how to handle elegantly.

This is not about projecting each individual player for that purpose. It is about the aggregate. For this reason I spread the games missed evenly across everyone. Someone important will get hurt, but it is impossible to forecast who exactly.

If I didn't have any of the big guys getting hurt it may have seemed unrealistic because players do get hurt and we would be banking on health and probably forecasting another 15 goals in what is already a pretty high total.

I guess the real point was, do we think this team scores over 300 goals and allows under 220? If the answer is "yes" then how is it not a first place team?

 

[weems]

ESPN posted some projections a few days ago

 

[LeafEgo]

If I have it right the objective here is to project team stats, and the method and assumptions make sense, but you can't pick it apart at the player level because some variables are peanut buttered across.

It's good to see the results come out favourably, but like most projections using historical data, it's not worth too much. Berubes gotta pull it all together.

 

[Evilhomer]

ESPN posted some projections a few days agoView attachment 903014

View attachment 903012

View attachment 903013

View attachment 903016

These look more accurate to me, but I think Marner gets to 100 points.

 

[notbias]

ESPN posted some projections a few days agoView attachment 903014

View attachment 903012

View attachment 903013

View attachment 903016

Projecting 65 goals for someone and it being believable is hilarious and amazing.

Only 53 to be the all-time goal-scoring leader for the Leafs.

And 43 to enter the top 100 all-time in the NHL.

65 goals would put him at 79th (likely lower because there are some active players just ahead of him).

Matthews is special.

 

[Racer88]

Sounds like a lot of wishful thinking and speculations

 

[Burnie97]

If we want to believe that past results are an indicator for future performance then it looks like we have a pretty good hockey team on our hands here. I ran a pretty basic projection model by doing the following:

• Configured lines and pairings to allocate minutes (ES, PP, SH)
• Forecasted approximately 210 man-games-lost-to-injury and distributed those across F (117), D (80) and G (20) pretty evenly though I did give the older guys more than the younger guys.
• Lost games were filled by Reaves, Grebyebkin, Steeves, Minten, Cowan, Timmins, Hakanpaa, and Murray
• With GP and minutes in place, I projected everyone based on last year's actual per-minute performance. I used Dewar's Minnesota result, Tanev's Dallas, and Murray's 2022-23. For the kids and call-ups, I just pegged them to others. I had Cowan perform as Minten did in his 9-game call-up, and Minten will put up Holmberg-like results, Grebyonkin-like Robertson, etc. This was somewhat arbitrary but has little bottom-line impact due to their small sample sizes.
• I did not mess with any of the results, for example, Holmberg should get better results on a line with Nylander and Marner, I also didn't forecast growth and improvement from guys like Knies, McMann, Robertson, Woll, or Liljegren as those might be offset by declines from Tavares, Rielly, OEL, etc. I did lower the SA per game from 29.84 to 29. We did add some strong dmen and have a new coach.
• I just used last year's SH goals and ENG as projecting them was not something I could easily figure out a simple model for.

With all of this, our team projects to score 293 goals while allowing 217 for a +76 projected goal differential. That is eight better than anyone had last year and 36 better than we had.

So, are we the best team in the NHL? Are we that improved? Note, that these are not MY PREDICTIONS, these are what the data tells us will happen based on historical data and the assumptions above. What's the flaw in the model?

View attachment 902946

As soon as I saw JT only getting 40 points ...

Okay... People can knock on him all they want.... that's funny.

He's getting 60 minimum. He plays with elite players. He's also still much better than people want to admit.

I'd love him to do more but Holy shit.

 

[Nineteen67]

Is it even possible to be cap compliant with that collection of 29 players and most playing 50+ games?

 

[Aashir Mallik]

Thanks, yeah it is the injuries that I didn't know how to handle elegantly.

This is not about projecting each individual player for that purpose. It is about the aggregate. For this reason I spread the games missed evenly across everyone. Someone important will get hurt, but it is impossible to forecast who exactly.

If I didn't have any of the big guys getting hurt it may have seemed unrealistic because players do get hurt and we would be banking on health and probably forecasting another 15 goals in what is already a pretty high total.

I guess the real point was, do we think this team scores over 300 goals and allows under 220? If the answer is "yes" then how is it not a first place team?

Yea fair enough, either you distribute the games somewhat evenly over everyone, or you have to pick and be biased about who misses games. Having David kampf miss those games isn’t the same as nylander missing them.

Yea I guess it doesn’t seem too awful, there’s variance from one person to another. For example I don’t think domi is gonna be pacing for 65 points, but I also don’t think Tavares is going to be pacing for 50, so you can adjust there. Similarly, I don’t think we see such huge disparities between goaltending, but again you can probably just adjust to make it more realistic for both guys (woll being a bit better and stolarz being a bit worse).

I think however, that the GAA is a bit lower than I'd expect it to be. It would be the best the team has had since the lockout (quick google search so could be wrong). Just for reference, it would be the same as our pace was canadian division, and I would say our defence isn't as strong as it was then.

Rielly = Rielly
Muzzin >> McCabe
Brodie => Tanev
Holl => Liljegren
Bogosian =< OEL
Dermott << Benoit

I think we have a much stronger, reliable, and versatile bottom pairing now, but I do believe our top 4 was stronger than. Moreover, I don't know if Berube can improve THAT much over Keefe's systems, I remember at his peak, the leafs were top 10ish in terms of defensive stats (CA, HDCA, SA..etc) an dif he does improve on that I don't know if he can actually sustain a 300+ goal scoring offence.

The goaltending will probably be aroud the same, we won't have a goalie post campbell sort of numbers, but in the same way we probably won't have a goalie post anderen type numbers either.

I really do think that we are a playoff team, but Idk about first place and this further solidifies my understanding because I've tried really hard to find some big flaw or some big discrepency that can't be adjusted through spreading the overrage throughout, but I am having trouble doing so.

For example, I think 63G for Matthews in those games is kinda high, it's gonna be hard to repeat last season's totals, and Marner's paced for 30+ for the last 4 years, but since the point of the exercise is to see the aggregate of the team, you could just assume an adjustment between the two.

Similarly with Timmins providing that level of production from the backend, but I also think Rielly and Benoit provide more points than listed so it equals out.

But I think our GAA is a bit low, maybe 15-20 lower than it should be and a differential of 56-61 doesn't actually win the Atlantic surprisingly, so I think if everything goes right with our goaltending and offence than we should/can compete for 1st. I am wary however, because although the stats don't seem too far-fetched I believed the same thing the year prior but it didn't play out that way.