What is it with these two and producing in the playoffs? It drives me absolutely bonkers seeing the other superstar forwards of the league score like gangbusters throughout their frequent long playoff runs whille these guys go home in round 1 with mediocre (at best) numbers.
Just look at the list of the highest producers in the last four regular seasons combined and how they've done in the playoffs:
| Player | RS PPG | PO GP | PO PPG | Diff | Notes |
| McDavid | 1.52 | 8 | 1.63 | 7.2 | Includes wide open play-in series (which he lost) |
| Kucherov | 1.36 | 52 | 1.25 | -8.1 | |
| MacKinnon | 1.3 | 38 | 1.47 | 13.1 | |
| Draisaitl | 1.29 | 8 | 1.38 | 7.0 | Includes wide open play-in series (which he lost) |
| Marchand | 1.26 | 56 | 1.04 | -17.5 | |
| Panarin | 1.19 | 19 | 1.05 | -11.8 | |
| Kane | 1.16 | 9 | 1 | -13.8 | Small sample includes play-in series but guy has always been a PO beast |
| Malkin | 1.16 | 21 | 0.81 | -30.2 | Has mailed it in a little recently, but dude has nothing left to prove |
| Crosby | 1.16 | 26 | 1.04 | -10.3 | Includes his last great playoff (2018), downhill since then |
| Pastrnak | 1.14 | 53 | 1.11 | -2.6 | |
| Matthews | 1.12 | 26 | 0.73 | -34.8 | |
| Rantanen | 1.12 | 38 | 1.26 | 12.5 | |
| Stamkos | 1.11 | 29 | 0.93 | -16.2 | A historically poor playoff performer, yet still looks much better than the Leafs |
| Marner | 1.07 | 26 | 0.81 | -24.3 | |
| Barkov | 1.06 | 10 | 1.1 | 3.8 | |
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There are caveats and excuses associated with a few of these players, but for the most part, every player on this list approaches their regular season scoring rate. Matthews' -34% is unacceptable. Marner's -24.3% is inexcusable. This happens to everyone - Crosby, Malkin, Yzerman, Sakic,but when their 20 year careers are over you can forgive them for their 2-3 worst playoffs when they gave so much otherwise. In this case, it's now five years into their careers and this is the
only playoff sample they have thus far. Yes they are chokers.
If there was a league-wide trend where star players' scoring plummeted drastically and role players took more of a center stage in the muck, then that would be understandable. But these other guys aren't having the same problems! I'm honestly just jealous about whatever it is players like Kucherov, MacKinnon, Marchand, and Pastrnak have that allows them to just score at will in the playoffs as though it's still the regular season.
What are they doing wrong? Do they need a psychologist? Why is it so easy for Matthews to score almost a goal per game in the regular season and then so difficult in the playoffs? What is he doing differently (or doing not differently?) Why is the opposition stopping him so easily when he was unstoppable before? Someone has to get to the bottom of this. This is disgusting.
edit: Are they just too predictable? In the regular season they seem to be creative enough, predictable enough to get a lot done - what changes in the playoffs? Back in 2008-2010, Ovechkin began to be criticized for being too predictable with his favourite play in the playoffs, and they were right - EVEN STILL, THE DUDE WON A PLAYOFF SERIES, AND MATCHED HIS REGULAR SEASON PPG WITH 40 POINTS IN 28 GAMES BEING TOO PREDICTABLE!
