Someone on r/leafs posted the playoff stats of the last 60 years of playoff numbers recently, and it really put into stark contrast just how poorly Tavares has performed. His numbers for what he's being paid are abysmal in the postseason.
I went back to 1970-71 when Sittler broke into the league and was the Leafs first star in the post-expansion era. In terms of raw points over those 53 postseasons, Tavares ranks 21st among Leafs. Now granted, that's unfair as some guys have played more than twice as many games as him. However when it comes to points-per-game, among players who have played at least two 7 game series worth of games (14) Tavares ranks an even worse 25th.
That's not only behind our current crop of stars like Matthews, Marner, Nylander, and Rielly (a defenseman!), or our stars of yesteryear like Gilmour, Sittler, McDonald, Clark, Sundin, Keon, and Turnbull (another defenseman!), it's also behind lesser stars and role players like Anderson, Thomas, Gartner, Berezin, and Van Riemsdyk.
For $11 million a year John should not be just barely above half a point-per-game in the playoffs (0.63 to be exact). He at least should be matching the PPG pace of Nylander and Roberts (both at 0.80). John suffers the biggest points pace drop off of the core players, dropping 0.32 points from 0.95 in the regular season to 0.63 in the playoffs. For comparison, Matthews drops 0.28 points, Marner drops 0.23, Nylander drops .09, and Rielly actually improves going from 0.68 in the regular season to 0.70 in the playoffs.
Regardless of everything else, when it comes down to it Tavares has simply not produced enough in the playoffs. For a player of his skill and stature, it's been a tremendous disappointment. The guy that was supposed to put this team into true contender status has simply failed to perform when the games matter most. He's not solely responsible for this teams many failures, but he hasn't helped matters all that much either.