Dear Scoring Race Diary: Today Dr. Drai Found Me (Day 58)

[Video Nasty]

With another goal and assist tonight, Draisaitl ended MacKinnon’s 58 day reign at the top of the scoring race.

R.I.P. December 10, 2024- February 5, 2025.

Will MacKinnon take back the lead as early as tomorrow night, or is this the beginning of the end of him ever winning an Art Ross?

Click to read more...

 

[CashMash]

Drai is a goalscoring machine this year. As much as I don't like Kucherov, I still think he will snatch the Art Ross somehow.

 

[Mez]

Damn bro, aggressive thread title.

 

[Zirakzigil]

Thread title edited. There was nothing deceptive about Mackinnon leading the points race.

 

[KlefDown]

Top 3 player and he's not 3


Goals - 38 (1st in NHL)
Points - 81 (1st)
ES Goals - 28 (1st)
ES Points - 59 (1st)
Game Winning Goals - 9 (1st)
Game-tying & go ahead pts- 47 (1st)

 

[Esq]

He was outstanding tonight. What else is new.

 

[Kerberos]

Thread title edited. There was nothing deceptive about Mackinnon leading the points race.

A lead based on 10 more EN points than Drai, so yeah, you can actually argue there was.

But no arguing Draisaitl has been the best player in the league this season while also having almost 2x the goals MacKinnon does.

 

[Frank Drebin]

I'm biased towards Drai obviously but I just found/find Mackinnon so hard to cheer for after seeing those EN numbers.

 

[Zirakzigil]

A lead based on 10 more EN points than Drai, so yeah, you can actually argue there was.

Points are points.

Doesn't matter, Draisaitl has been the best player in the league this season. And it's not really close.

If that was true than he wouldnt of just passed Mackinnon

 

[Kerberos]

Points are points.

If that was true than he wouldnt of just passed Mackinnon

Seems like you haven't watched Draisaitl much, if at all this year and that's fine.

You don't think a player who has 2x more goals, 10 more non-EN points and more ES points while playing incredible defensive hockey is having a much better season than the player we're comparing him to? Interesting analysis I suppose.

 

[Zirakzigil]

Seems like you haven't watched Draisaitl much, if at all this year and that's fine.

You don't think a player who has 2x more goals, 10 more non-EN points and more ES points while playing incredible defensive hockey is having a much better season than the player we're comparing him to? Interesting analysis I suppose.

Your exact words were "its not really close." Draisaitl has been the best player in the league, but hes not running away with it. He also happens to have the #4 player for points on his team. MacKinnons next closest team mate is 19th. If Draisaitl was running away with league MVP than he should be blowing away his opposition. Also, numerous hockey analysts would dispute that hes been better over Hughes.

 

[PAZ]

Seems like you haven't watched Draisaitl much, if at all this year and that's fine.

You don't think a player who has 2x more goals, 10 more non-EN points and more ES points while playing incredible defensive hockey is having a much better season than the player we're comparing him to? Interesting analysis I suppose.

I'm confused, I don't see anyone implying that Mackinnon was having a better season than Draisaitl, but that would be a discussion for the Hart trophy. For the scoring race and Art Ross, points are points and that's the only thing that matters. If you think it's deceptive, petition for EN points to not count like shootout goals.

 

[Video Nasty]

Your exact words were "its not really close." Draisaitl has been the best player in the league, but hes not running away with it. He also happens to have the #4 player for points on his team. MacKinnons next closest team mate is 19th. If Draisaitl was running away with league MVP than he should be blowing away his opposition. Also, numerous hockey analysts would dispute that hes been better over Hughes.

You don’t think it’s a little disingenuous to fail to mention that up until two weeks ago, for the first 49 games of the season, MacKinnon’s closest teammate was 6th in league scoring?

 

[Hallonbroder]

Meh. Don’t get me wrong, I think Draisaitl is a world class-player… but I’ve also seen a lot of his goals over the years, and soooo many come after McDavid’s been dangling 3-4 people and setting Drai up for an empty net.

I’d love to see his production away from the best offensive player since Mario/Jagr

 

[AddyTheWrath]

He also happens to have the #4 player for points on his team. MacKinnons next closest team mate is 19th.

Seems pretty disingenuous to pretend Rantanen doesn't exist considering McDavid had 1 more point than him before he was traded 12 days ago.

You don’t think it’s a little disingenuous to fail to mention that up until two weeks ago, for the first 49 games of the season, MacKinnon’s closest teammate was 6th in league scoring?

I promise I read your response after I posted mine but wow we even phrased it almost the exact same way,

 

[CanadasTeam99]

Draisaitl is MVP right now

#1 in so many stats

Goals
Points
ES goals
ES points
Game winners
Some others

Maybe 1-2 EN points max.

This is a guy scored 50 goals in a year without one EN goal

Or Helly

 

[Matty Sundin]

I think Drais will win it and the hart but Nate could literally take it back tommorow lol

 

[BertMcDrai]

Meh. Don’t get me wrong, I think Draisaitl is a world class-player… but I’ve also seen a lot of his goals over the years, and soooo many come after McDavid’s been dangling 3-4 people and setting Drai up for an empty net.

I’d love to see his production away from the best offensive player since Mario/Jagr

His production away from McD this year; 6games: 5goals, 11 Points, +4, point pace over 82 is 150...this matches almost his production away from McD over the last 6/7 seasons (something around 20 games)..these stats were with McDavid not in the lineup...

while this year:
MacKinnon without Rantanen; 6games,5points, -2, point pace over 82 is 68...outch.

The only one who has been "gifted" was MacKinnon (this year) and now you can see it.
And yes small sample size, but now we will see how good MacKinnon really is and this still playing with Makar.

 

[The Panther]

Colorado is now suffering from the MacKinnon contract-signing problem. With him now getting paid what he's worth (unlike when they won the Cup in '22), it's hard for the Avs to spread the money around to build a strong supporting cast. Their top guys are great, but the rest is average, and the team defence has been below League-average this season.

However, this obviously hasn't affected MacKinnon's scoring pace. If anything, they depend on him more than ever to go out and do it by himself.

I get the feeling watching Edmonton this season that the team is going about 70% most nights. (There's the odd big game --- like the recent one vs. Vancouver --- where they're all going 100%, but not many.) McDavid is on and off, but they just seem to have an ability now to shut down other teams enough to wait them out until they can win, with minimal expended effort. In other words, they're a veteran-like club now.

The one guy who's been going hard all season is Draisaitl. He's so much better than he was last season! I actually feared after last season that his prime years might be over and a decline was starting. I was happy to be very wrong. The difference is, this season he's carrying the puck a lot more and skating hard (and fast) a lot more. And when he has the puck, nobody can get it off him.

This being said, I think it's gonna be hard for Drai to win the scoring title this year. But it's remarkable how close (in PPG) he, MacKinnon, McDavid, and Kucherov are.

 

[ViD]

I don’t think anyone can argue that Drai > McD this season