It’s down slightly but we can adjust for that. 60 this year in a 2.99 GPG environment would still be behind Matthews’ 69 last year in a 3.08 GPG environment (3.08/2.99 x60= 62), slightly behind McDavid’s 64 in a 3.14 GPG environment (3.14/2.99 x60 = 63), and slightly ahead of Pasta’s 62 the same year. Matthews’ 60 in ‘22 would be behind (3.11/2.99 x 60= 62), but still better per game (60/73 x82= 67). Matthews’ pace (41/52 x82 = 65) in the Covid shortened season was also better (2.90/2.99 x 60 = 58). Even in 19-20, a similar scoring environment, Ovechkin was on pace for 58 before Covid shut the season down. It really doesn’t stand out from the other top goalscoring seasons the past 5 years before this one.
And if we look at the 5th place and 10th place goalscorers, we see that he doesn’t have a bigger lead over his peers than those other seasons, other than the top guys
Currently he’s out scoring 10th place by 53%
Last year, Matthews outscored 10th place by 57%
22-23, McDavid outscored 10th place by 52%
21-22, Matthews outscored 10th place by 43%
20-21, Matthews outscored 10th place by 58%
19-20, Ovechkin and Pasta outscored 10th place by 41%
It’s a very good goal scoring year, and we’ve had a number of strong goalscoring years recently that he fits in with, but it’s not better than those years just because no one else is having a very good goal scoring year. It’s a little like the 2010s for Ovechkin. He was having some strong goalscoring years but his competition was pretty weak which makes them look better than they were if we were only to compare him to the 2nd place finishers.