2024/2025 Statistical Projections [Team and Players]

[conFABulator]

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.

Some of that is I have him only playing 60 games because I spread the inevitable gea lost to injury disproportionately across the older guys. If he plays a full season at that ice time and scoring rate he is up to 55 or so and that's a strong third line with Robertson and McMann. It's also a function of third line minutes which I think is where we want him. We might find his scoring rate increases with third line matchups.

Again, the team would score close to 300 goals with a more balanced attack. We want this for the playoffs. Not two lines and feeling bad about it has 2C in a Boston series.

 

[conFABulator]

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.

There is so much great discussion points here, but I will refrain from responding point by point.

My summary is that you answered my question, where is the model flawed, I wasn't saying I had cracked the atom on this because it doesn't feel like we have a first place team here, but the data suggests we could be.

What this model tells me I that IF we

(a) Have a third line (JT) that can warrant getting 12 ES minutes a night we see MORE offense from the top nine. We need to solve 2C before we decide if we are keeping Marner. I like Nylander or even Holmberg centering a second line with Marner.

Domi is interesting because this strong season is the pace he set last year, can be sustain it with more ice time? Playing with Matthews and getting some PP time would help.

(b) You touched on this, but the other factor is goaltending. Stolarz has stellar stats, can be bring the for 35 games, if so he is 20 to 25 fewer GA than what Samsonov gave us last year. That seems huge.

I think the potential of our goaltending gets overlooked at what could most impact our results this year. Can Stolarz be a 1b and can Woll stay healthy. The data suggests if the answers are two yeses the we are a greatly improved team.

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[conFABulator]

ESPN posted some projections a few days agoView attachment 903014

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This is interesting, thanks for sharing.

They assume each of the core four will be healthy all year. I believe they are also projecting improvements for each of them over last year (when it comes to points).

Even with me discounting totals for injuries I still had us close to 300 goals on the year, that would have had us near the top last year.

If we believe our offense can score like it did last year and it we believe our D an G are improved that should reduce the GA. That makes us a top team in the league.

I don't see many people predicting that for us. So, what's unlikeliest?

- we score like we did last year?
- we allow fewer goals than we did last year?

 

[Skinnyjimmy08]

Is Woll going to be your guys main man in net for years to come???

 

[Evilhomer]

This is interesting, thanks for sharing.

They assume each of the core four will be healthy all year. I believe they are also projecting improvements for each of them over last year (when it comes to points).

Even with me discounting totals for injuries I still had us close to 300 goals on the year, that would have had us near the top last year.

If we believe our offense can score like it did last year and it we believe our D an G are improved that should reduce the GA. That makes us a top team in the league.

I don't see many people predicting that for us. So, what's unlikeliest?

- we score like we did last year?
- we allow fewer goals than we did last year?

I'm sure it will be fashionable to not predict a high finish for the Leafs, but even with average goaltending (and I think the Leafs will get a lot better than average goaltending) the Leafs will improve on last season's points total. It will be the season where they finally win the division and win a few rounds in the playoffs, even with four guys making more than $10 million.

 

[cookie]

I like OP's projections and the workings behind said projections, but those minutes are sort of unbelievable. Knies at 20 each night? Jarnkrok, Kampf, and Dewar at 8 apiece? Tavares at 14? That discrepancy is concerning. The defense minutes seem to imply we'll be going with 7D for most of the year. I'd love to see the minutes reworked to look more like ESPN's projections.

 

[Nineteen67]

Is Woll going to be your guys main man in net for years to come???

The Leafs are hoping he is, he’s good and has potential, but it’s still unknown whether he’s a number one.

 

[conFABulator]

I'm sure it will be fashionable to not predict a high finish for the Leafs, but even with average goaltending (and I think the Leafs will get a lot better than average goaltending) the Leafs will improve on last season's points total. It will be the season where they finally win the division and win a few rounds in the playoffs, even with four guys making more than $10 million.

I feel the same way. I also agree with your "fashionable to not predict a high finish" sentiment.

When I worked out this model, I was a bit surprised and what the data suggests could happen even without players improving on last year.

The biggest changes and improvements incorporated into my model are

(a) New dmen and coach will reduce the shots we give up every game from 29.84 to 29 and that doesn't seem too big a leap, and

(b) Stolarz plays at the level be did last year for 35 games and that Woll is healthy for 35 games at the same level as last year (Murray plays the final 12 games at the level he performed at two years ago for us). This could be small leap, but if Stolarz plays below last year it is just as possible that Woll improves a bit on last year.

Size once again. There is either something wrong with my model or the Leafs are a really good team. Which is it?

 

[Evilhomer]

I feel the same way. I also agree with your "fashionable to not predict a high finish" sentiment.

When I worked out this model, I was a bit surprised and what the data suggests could happen even without players improving on last year.

The biggest changes and improvements incorporated into my model are

(a) New dmen and coach will reduce the shots we give up every game from 29.84 to 29 and that doesn't seem too big a leap, and

(b) Stolarz plays at the level be did last year for 35 games and that Woll is healthy for 35 games at the same level as last year (Murray plays the final 12 games at the level he performed at two years ago for us). This could be small leap, but if Stolarz plays below last year it is just as possible that Woll improves a bit on last year.

Size once again. There is either something wrong with my model or the Leafs are a really good team. Which is it?

The easy answer is that the Leafs are a really good team, and they now have a coach and a defense that will elevate them to being a top 3-5 team in the league. Fans and the media will doubt them at the start of the season, and by midway through the season the bandwagon will be more crowded than an Indian train.

 

[notbias]

The easy answer is that the Leafs are a really good team, and they now have a coach and a defense that will elevate them to being a top 3-5 team in the league. Fans and the media will doubt them at the start of the season, and by midway through the season the bandwagon will be more crowded than an Indian train.

They've had better D

 

[conFABulator]

They've had better D

For sure. I think the comparison is to last year with this projection model.

How does the F group compare to last year? The D? And the G?

Do you think we are worse in any of these areas than we were last year? Any areas we are NOT better?

 

[notbias]

For sure. I think the comparison is to last year with this projection model.

How does the F group compare to last year? The D? And the G?

Do you think we are worse in any of these areas than we were last year? Any areas we are NOT better?

Last year Treliving just asked who had the most social media followers and signed them... it looks like he put some more effort in this year, although I do question some moves, it's been decent.

Goaltending is probably better, D is better, forwards are essentially the same.

 

[conFABulator]

Last year Treliving just asked who had the most social media followers and signed them... it looks like he put some more effort in this year, although I do question some moves, it's been decent.

Goaltending is probably better, D is better, forwards are essentially the same.

Last year was a terrible time to bring in a new GM, that wasn't Tre's fault. If anyone's it was Shanny's...he fired Dubas late and brought in Tre later and then announced none of the core four were leaving. It was too late fire Keefe even.

As for this summer, I agree with you F, D, and G assessment. That makes us a better team. Samsonov was terrible even when he was winning. We should see a lift with Stolarz in and Woll playing more.

 

[Evilhomer]

They've had better D

Not at the same time as they have had the forward quality and maturity, goaltending quality and coaching quality they have now.

 

[ULF_55]

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?

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How does the historical trends impact projected missed games.
Some seem rather high based on history.

 

[conFABulator]

How does the historical trends impact projected missed games.
Some seem rather high based on history.

They are almost all high based on history.

Based on this recurring theme in the feedback, this seems to be the part of the model that I didn't develop the correct approach for.

I (somewhat arbitrarily) decided that the Leafs would lose around 200 man games to injury next year. I say arbitrarily because I could not find reliable data as a baseline. For example, I think the Leafs lost around 400 man games last year. This included Klingberg, Timmins, Reaves, and possibly Murray. So, I looked at the Leafs "starters" and came up with about 150 man games lost (Woll, Marner, McMann, and a few others). It seemed like we were abnormally healthy last year in terms of key players, so I upped it to 200 and figured I would rather err on the side of conservatism as I imagined the feedback I would get otherwise was that I was too optimistic in forecasting a healthy year and no injuries.

Obviously, I can't predict who will get hurt specifically so I spread those 200 games across the roster. I did to give Tanev and Tavares more, based on age. I did have our goalies losing games based on track record, etc.

It looks funny, but I believe in the aggregate it was the best approach. Maybe, we won't lose ten games from each of Nylander, Matthews and Marner, but odds are we are due to lose 30 or more from one of them one of these years.

Maybe 150 is a better number than 200? Again, I wanted to be realistic rather than optimistic. A healthier roster only adds to our GF and reduces our GA in this model. We are already tracking for a very, very strong goal differential.

 

[notDatsyuk]

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.

If Matthews is playing with Knies and Domi, and Nylander is playing with Holmberg and Marner, which elite players will be playing with JT?

My biggest question is why Nylander, who has missed 8 games in 8 seasons, only 1 in the last 3, and none in the last two, is suddenly expected to miss 9; and after four consecutive seasons of improved ppg, he suddenly falls off, despite being on a line with a better centre than last year and a better winger than ever?

 

[Racer88]

If Matthews is playing with Knies and Domi, and Nylander is playing with Holmberg and Marner, which elite players will be playing with JT?

My biggest question is why Nylander, who has missed 8 games in 8 seasons, only 1 in the last 3, and none in the last two, is suddenly expected to miss 9; and after four consecutive seasons of improved ppg, he suddenly falls off, despite being on a line with a better centre than last year and a better winger than ever?

That’s the million dollar question isn’t it. It looks to me like it’s just all made up stuff

 

[conFABulator]

If Matthews is playing with Knies and Domi, and Nylander is playing with Holmberg and Marner, which elite players will be playing with JT?

My biggest question is why Nylander, who has missed 8 games in 8 seasons, only 1 in the last 3, and none in the last two, is suddenly expected to miss 9; and after four consecutive seasons of improved ppg, he suddenly falls off, despite being on a line with a better centre than last year and a better winger than ever?

JT doesn't play with elite players, he plays with Robertson and McMann. That trio worked well last year and is probably a stronger third line that .last teams can ice.

As for the Nylander and games played, this has been explained already in this thread; injuries happen. I have is at 200 man games lost to injury and I spread those across all players fairly.evenly. The point here was to project how many goals this team would score next year, not to make accurate individual projections. I probably got every player wrong because one guy will miss thirty games to injury and not three guys missing ten each. Also, Nylander missed three out of seven playoff games to injury, something that could be recurring...just saying.

If you were trying to project total goals for a team, how would you handle injuries?

 

[BrannigansLaw]

I'm sure it will be fashionable to not predict a high finish for the Leafs, but even with average goaltending (and I think the Leafs will get a lot better than average goaltending) the Leafs will improve on last season's points total. It will be the season where they finally win the division and win a few rounds in the playoffs, even with four guys making more than $10 million.

Ah yes, i see you’ve started predicting again.

I’m still waiting for us to catch Boston. Remember that?

 

[conFABulator]

That’s the million dollar question isn’t it. It looks to me like it’s just all made up stuff

Usually a "million dollar question" might be one with no answer to it. This one has been answered several times in this thread already.

One more time...

Teams suffer injuries. Last year's the Leafs had over 400 man games lost to injury. A lot of this games were Klingberg and Murray and Timmins, not core players. So I reduced this year's projected number to 200 (not entirely arbitrarily as I looked at games lost by core players last year and it was around 150). I rounded up. I took those games and spread them across all players because we have no way of knowing who will actually get injured. I did go higher on older players like Tavares and Tanev. I also gave the goalies a high number based on track record.

The objective here was to project how many goals this lineup could score next year based on last year's results for each player in the lineup. This requires projecting GP and minutes per game. Therefore it requires injuries to be factored in.

Do you see any other way to make this projection and account for injuries differently than I did. Serious and sincere question for anyone that has an idea.

I think the larger problem here is that people don't read the actual text in the first thread which explained this. They go right to the chart or pile on the comment from someone who didn't read the text.

In fact, the methodology that answers the question of GP per player (and minutes) are the first two bullet points in my original post.

 

[conFABulator]

Is Woll going to be your guys main man in net for years to come???

It seems like we are hoping so, we just signed him for three years beyond this one. He can tandem with Stolarz for a couple of years and then get supported and/or pushed by Hildeby or Akhtyamov.

It looks like this is the plan and I think most of us are good with that as long as Woll can stay healthy. He has had injuries to this point, though different and random ones as opposed to having one body part of specific concern.

 

[conFABulator]

I like OP's projections and the workings behind said projections, but those minutes are sort of unbelievable. Knies at 20 each night? Jarnkrok, Kampf, and Dewar at 8 apiece? Tavares at 14? That discrepancy is concerning. The defense minutes seem to imply we'll be going with 7D for most of the year. I'd love to see the minutes reworked to look more like ESPN's projections.

That's fair feedback.

I would love to see other people's forecasted distribution of ice time. It's not as easy as it seems when trying to factor in special teams, balance, depth, load management of top players in preparation for the playoffs.

My allocations are based on three scoring lines, not burning star players on the PK too much, two PP units, and even "phasing out" Kampf and Jarnkrok a bit while we increase time for Knies, McMann, Holmberg and Robertson. I have Tavares at 3C and PP2. I think he can give us four more good years if deployed properly actually.

The line up these minutes are based on is

Knies Matthews Domi
Nylander Holmberg Marner
Robertson Tavares McMann
Dewar Kampf Jarnkrok

Reilly Tanev
OEL Liljegren
Benoit McCabe

The PP consists of two units featuring eight of our top nine forwards, with Holmberg being the odd man out. I have Rielly, OEL and Lilly on the PP points.

I am very interested in how others would allocate minutes and my model could run the projections based on this quite easily. What are ESPN's projected minutes and GP? I will run this.

To be honest, I find a lot of these projections are not possible unless we assume 12 healthy forwards playing 82 games (basically)

 

[egd27]

wishful thinking indeed…

Would be interested to see your list of Leaf forwards better than Tavares. (aside from 34.88.16)

*feel free to add any reasoning for your opinions

 

[RunItBackAgain]

Would be interested to see your list of Leaf forwards better than Tavares. (aside from 34.88.16)

*feel free to add any reasoning for your opinions

The post I quoted never said forwards specifically. I’d easily have Rielly above him. And I bet he gets out paced by a couple other forwards this year. Maybe Domi and Knies.