Martin Skoula
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How crazy that Mess's chart cuts off right before we see Marner's 17/18 series, total coincidence.
Mitch Marner Discussion Continued
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How crazy that Mess's chart cuts off right before we see Marner's 17/18 series, total coincidence.
Racer88
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TB is the Champ, so comparing us to TB is normal. Whats abnormal is thinking we are on the same path as TB. I think we are more the early 90s Wings, all flashes but couldnt get it done in the playoffs. Hopefully that will change, but it will be up to the CORE to step up more than guys that plays on the 3rd or 4th line.
1. Thats a few years ago.
2. Won't that just make Marner looked worse, bc it showed he is capable of delivering but just couldn't do it now.
3. He got like under 70 pts in the regular season back then. Maybe he should aim for that and save himself for the playoffs?
He didn't deliver this past playoffs. Bc if he did, we won't be here discussing him. Just look at Willie, he delivered and thats the end of story.
The question should be can Marner deliver this coming playoffs? If he could and Leafs advances, then all is good. If he could but the Leafs still lose in the first round, that will be another question. However, if he couldn't deliver again while others could, trading him might be good for both the Leafs and him.
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Weird... I'm not seeing "5 first round losses in a row" with those other examples.
Not directly comparing the Leafs to Tampa here really, just using them for context as Tampa are the champs and easy to use to get my points across.
I've already rolled out why the Leafs have been incredibly unlucky the last couple of years and it shouldnt be in dispute by anyone but, even so, how much of the inability to overcome the odds lets say, should be pinned on Marner (and Matthews as well seeing as they are attached at the hip the last couple of years)?
Matthews/Marner 5v5 the last two playoffs:
GP: 12
CF%: 55.53
SF%: 59.47
xGF%: 66.98
Goal Differential (GF%): 65.40
Its not just underlaying fancy stats that show dominance, its straight-up goal differential. Despite their lack of production, they completely stymied the enemy attack to the point their production was overwhelmingly positive and thats with goaltending not on their side.
Was Marner giving away the puck more 5v5?
Regular season giveaway rate: 3.37/60
Playoff giveaway rate: 1.43/60
Yet another number going against the narratives as Marner went from having the worst giveaway rate on the team during the regular season to a very tidy number indeed. ( I know the puck over the glass penalties are rough here but bad luck gonna bad luck I guess)
A problem with your comparisons is that Marners numbers are decent to elite in the playoffs, especially taking into account of the other players on the team. It wasnt his giveaways that actually cost the team games (Galchenyuk, Dermott, Sandin), ot wasnt his lack of D that was letting Armia, Perry and Staal combine for 12 points in the series (as he and Matthews absolutely choked the life out of their checkers, especially Danault) and was less his lack of shot and more the goaltender making a big save on it really.
All the data says the problem was less with the Leafs top players are more with their role players and bottom pairing (outside of Spezza).
Even the fairest criticism here comes into question when we find out Matthews was playing with that bad a wrist. (Hense his shot being off a bit). That being said, I thought Matthews was unquestionably the 2nd best player for either team in that series after Price. I'm quite confident Danault will never have worse defensive numbers in his career in a playoff matchup than he did against Matthews/Marner that series. Matthews not potting all those great opportunities are on him to be sure but then you hear he needs the surgery and even that seems like a tough critique.
Manning and Harden are interesting but bad analogies, not just because of the different nature of the sports but because they didnt outplay their opposition the way Marner/Matthews did. If they did they would have won (seeing the importance of their positions in those sports). Hockey is different though. McDavid/Draisaitl can have the best series in history and their team can still lose if the other guys dont pull their weight. Its the NHL playoffs. Lets stick to hockey analogies. The Penguins absolutely outplayed the Isles in their series but how the hell are you gonna win a series when team save% is 93.07-88.83? Pens got goalied again bad (after Price did it to them last year) and the better team lost and Crosby absolutely owned Barzals soul in that series....it didnt matter though and who takes the heat? I dont think Crosby should despite the fact he only has 5 points the last two playoffs. He's played far better than that.
It wouldnt be surprising to see the Pens rebound though and it wouldnt be surprising to see the Leafs go on a massive run either with Marner going on a tear. Can only get unlucky with injuries and matchups so long and all indications are that Marner is a real playoff gamer (looking back at his whole career). I'm sure Marner would just be drooling at the prospect of seeing a Jarry in net for once......and even then he could grab 10 points in 5 games and be seen as a hero.......and not played better than he did the last couple of playoffs. You see where I am coming from here right? (alright, alright, Ill stop ramblin too).
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Racer88
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A couple of quick points.
Despite all that fancy stats in the world there is no way any realistic fans of any team can say Matthews and Marner dominated anyone in the Habs series. They simply did not get the job done that they are paid a fortune to do.
take away, give away who cares if you can’t produce.
Spezza and Willy got the job done but basically nobody else did.
Yes we didn’t get much production out of the rest of the team but what do you expect when 4 players take up,so much money and you have to populate the rest with low paid sub standard players……..of course they are not going to produce.
As far as the bad luck scenario, well that’s been the excuse for 5 years now.
Winners make their own luck by utilizing their skill to the maximum.
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PromisedLand
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Owned! like a boss!
now lets see the expected BS/60 that will but natural follow
Bad luck has only been even raised for 3 years and even then it's only if you count having the worse goaltending in every series bad luck. I'd say for the last two years the Leafs have had the clear better team and suffered from an awful stretch of misfortune.
Hockey just ain't the pretty points and celebrations either. It's why, despite the high point totals, Nylander still lagged behind Matthews and Marner in differentials including goal differential. Despite not putting the puck in the net, the top line literally destroyed a very effective Habs top line to the point it had to be dismantled.......which leads to:
The erasure of Danault in the series.
Danault has always been an underrated player who, along with Gallagher, formed one of the more potent two way lines for a while now. His underlying numbers show he was caved in so badly against the Leafs top line it was probably in the Habs best interest to get him away from them but there's no other option really. Prices brilliance and Matthews wonky wrist really saved him an even more embarrassing series. You will never see a worse series from him the rest of his career IMO. He was MUCH better against every other team the rest of the way, including Tampa.
BTW, "get paid a fortune"..."so much money"....
That's exactly what I was talking about earlier.
We can have a discussion about allocation of cap and how much that effected the team.
Which changes absolutely nothing about the underlying point. Also, for the record, LA never got past the 1st round before winning their cup.
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Wafflewhipper
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In what ways.I don’t like him burning himself out on energy intensive penalty killing no matter what. Last 30 seconds with last change and opposition is keeping their powerplay top line on to long i want him on. Having him start a PK really annoys me in numerous ways.
If Marner breaks a foot killing a penalty I’m not goung to forgive and forget Keefe for it
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Yes PK. No need for him to play 1.20 on the pk and then after a 20 second test back on the ice. Far to many shift with short rest in between. He was gassed far to many times while on the ice.
Gary Nylund
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In these playoffs, M&M&Hyman scored just two goals between them over the entire 7 game series so a goal differential of around 65% would mean outscoring the opposition about 2-1. That's not much over 7 games, it's not even close to being dominance and it's much less than what you'd hope for from a line featuring two players with a combined cap hit of 22+ million going up against the "powerhouse" that is MTL. The previous year, the same trio scored 3 goals in 5 games, that again is several notches below dominance. You want dominance, look at what the Bergeron line has done to us in the past. If I had the stomach to go look at the numbers, I think I'd find that those guys scored more goals in one single game than our guys managed in the entire 7 game playoff series and they did it more than once.
Those last 3 years ended with us being outscored by a combined 11-2 margin. We played listless hockey in every one of those games and if you want to explain how luck was a factor here, I'd love to hear it. But I think you know as well as I do that luck had nothing to do with it.
Gary Nylund
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I'm not sure if I buy the "coach burned him out" excuse but out of all the excuses I've heard, I have to say it's the only one that I think is actually possible. On the other hand, the last playoffs before Keefe his ice time doesn't seem like an issue and he still had only 4 points in 7 games. Anyhow, I hope you're right, I hope that is the problem because it's fixable and if that is the problem, they better fix it this time around.
Wafflewhipper
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I respect you for writing such long and informative post but essentially you are saying they were unlucky.
Just how unlucky are Marner and Matthews, it had been a few years in a row.
You kept comparing their 5 v 5 stats but both of them played on the PP and one of them played on the PK. You can’t keep blaming the coaches for their PP struggle, are they just robots and will only do what Keefe and others tell them without any suggestions or just won’t improvise?
These two are expected to lead the Leafs by putting up points on the scoreboard. It is not unreasonable to expect the Rocket winner to score more than a goal in the 7 games series or the 4th highest point getter and 1st team All Stars to have more than 2 points in 6 games(2pts in Game 2).
Everyone can keep going on with excuses…..how about taking accountability like whatever they were doing just ain’t good enough and that goes to Willie too despite his playoffs bc ultimately the Leafs didn’t advance.
Lastly, Price was far from unbeatable in Round One bc Muzzin got TWO pasted him, TJ got one, Willie for 5 and Spezza for a few, heck even Jumbo got one.
One last thing, maybe they weren’t on the Ice when Habs scored those two OT goals but they played the most for the Leafs, if only they got a goal in Game 5 or 6, it might not even be OT.
I am not saying let’s blame them….bc the whole team failed but the burden of failure is part of being leaders of the team and the elite players in the league.
Pasta/Bergeron/Marchand line against the Leafs 5v5 over the two playoffs:
GP: 13
CF%: 60.74
SF%: 57.14
SCF%: 60.66
HDCF% 51.22
xGF%: 55.54
Goal Differential (GF%): 53.85 (7 goals for, 6 goals Against)
Opposing Goalie save%: .908
Marner/Matthews line 5v5 the last 2 years:
GP: 12
CF%: 55.53
SF%: 59.47
SCF%: 56.97
HDCF: 69.98
xGF%: 66.98
Goal Differential (GF%): 65.40 (4 goals for, 2 goals Against)
Opposing Goalie save%: .967
Again, If not for stellar goaltending and injury issues, that Goals for number on the Leafs would be waaaay up.
Solid numbers from both lines but special teams made the difference against the Bruins as they roasted us in differential there. Andersen couldnt make a save on the PK against them to save his life.
The Leafs have outscored the opposition 6-4 on special teams the last two playoffs though.
Lately, I can see why Zeke is so big on Muzzin though as the Leafs record with and without him is crazy and you certainly notice a massive drop off in the Leafs play with him out of the lineup. Its as big a reason as any for the Leafs late series issues.
Essentially, I think Dubas should either trade for someone like Vas or draft someone like Vas bc at the end of the day, goaltending will always be the No.1 reason why Leafs either make it or break it.
Or it could just be that Leafs players, esp AM and Marner, for some unknown reason(like breaking the mirror) just keep making the opposing goalie looks unbeatable.
Or it could just be that Leafs players, esp AM and Marner, for some unknown reason(like breaking the mirror) just keep making the opposing goalie looks unbeatable.
I hear what you are saying but since I want this team to win, just want to point the fingers in the right direction. Even if you just wanted to go by points, 6 Leafs forwards had 32 points in the series and the rest had a combined total of 5.....in 7 games. Hyman, Mikheyev, Folgino, Thornton, Nash, Simmonds, Engvall and Brooks combined for 5 points in a 7 game series....and I'm supposed to get angry that snakebit Matthews and Marner only combined for 9 points while playing stellar D?
Just gotta re-tool and jump in the direction of what did work against Price and the Habs in the Final (and what many have been calling for actually). Get more bodies out front and "create your own luck" like Tampa did so effectively against the Habs. Ritchie and Bunting are guys that really take it to the net and I'm interested to see how they play out.
Gary Nylund
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That's not the full story though - I'm pretty sure you're leaving special teams out of this equation but I'm talking about goals scored, period. Look at how many goals the M&M line scored the last two playoffs and look at how many goals the Bergeron line scored against us in those two playoffs. Do that and I think you'll see a much different story then 7-6.
That's the problem with stats, there are a million of them and if can choose only the ones you like, you can find support for almost any agenda.
Gary Nylund
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Maybe get angry at the GM? After all, he's the one responsible for having half our cap tied up in 4 players, which is why we have random minimum wage guys making up the bulk of the supporting cast.
It comes with being leaders of the team.
When the Raps was struggling, KLo and DD got the most heat. Just Kawhi and George are getting blame for the Clippers. That’s just part of being the leaders of the team.
The fact that both AM and Marner made more than the whole bottom 6 combined is enough of a reason to expect them to lead the team.
Also, I don’t think it is fair to group Nash or Brooks who played like two to three games combined and I think their combined minutes of the whole series might be less than Marner and AM in one game. You can’t expect a one mil player leading the team to victory. There is a reason why Brooks or Nash are making 850-950 this coming season while AM and MM are making 10 times that.
Like I said, collectively the players just need to do a lot better than these past years bc whatever they had been doing, it ain’t enough.
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