I would disagree, that Matthews and Marner aren't playing well together. I think they are playing quite well overall. They've had fewer goals scored against them than normal, dominating possession, playing better defensively, and more physical. Matthews is 5th in the league in shots.... and is shooting 3%. The "struggle" is nearly entirely down to shooting percentage. I have no idea what is wrong there, but if he's shooting his career average of 16.2%, he has 4-5 more goals, and we are 6-1, and the entire narrative and story is different.
Where did Matty's shot go? This is only temporary though right?
Funny enough, we are playing the league leader in shots next game. Timo Meier 42 shots in his nine games. he has NO goals. LOL
More physical, for sure - Matthews especially. But in terms of Bunting/Matthews/Marner having those even-strength shifts where they completely dominate possession and generate a flurry of amazing scoring chances, I think they've had fewer of those than normal so far this season. Feels like there's about half as many of those legit dominant shifts per game now - I have no stats to back that up, but that's how it feels to me (I do watch most Leafs games every year, including this year).
But yeah, the weirdest thing is that Matthews' shot looks
bad, when normally it's beyond elite. I don't think it's a case of "he's shooting well but has been
unlucky", e.g. hitting posts, hot goalies making great saves, etc. He's just not shooting it well. Whiffing on 1-timers completely, poor power when he does connect, changing the angle less on his release, and poor accuracy (either missing the net or shooting it into the goalies chest). He's had a lot of shots, but few high quality ones. I've only seen this before when he had wrist injuries/surgery recovery, but as far as we know he's currently healthy. My thought is it may be mental - like he's in a bit of a mental funk,
AND his linemates love to feed him for shots, and he's just been "gripping his stick too tight." If that's it, I can see playing with 2 shooters like Robertson/Nylander being good, he could force shots less and feed Robertson/Nylander more, and maybe get back to more instinctive/natural shooting.
Harder to get out of a mental funk where you're doing X poorly if you're in an environment where there's huge pressure on you to do X well. Easier to get out if it if you switch to an environment where there's less pressure on you to do X at a high level. IMO playing with Robertson/Nylander would put less pressure on Matthews to be a shooter than with Bunting/Marner, and could thus help him get out of his shooting funk.