Auston Matthews can score.
He demonstrated as much in the Toronto Maple Leafs-Ottawa Senators three-game series in mid-February when he scored five goals. In 90 games over the last two seasons, Matthews has scored 111 points. It’s like he’s playing a video game with the difficulty set too low.
These are stats Matthews wouldn’t have achieved without his partner in crime, Mitch Marner. The teammates have a combined 61 points in the first 21 games of this season, scoring almost 40 per cent of all Toronto goals thus far.
It’s startling until you realize the pair of 23-year-olds receive 30 per cent of the team payroll—a combined $22.5 million. These players are expected to lead the team in performance.
A little further down the roster are two other superstar teammates, John Tavares and William Nylander. Just two months into the season, some of the loudest voices in hockey are already sounding their discontent with the performance of these two players. Nylander has even been dubbed “Assembly Still Required,” a play on his Swedish origin.
But are these criticisms worth their weight? This second line pair costs the team just $18 million, $4.5 million less than the top guys—a significant amount on a cap-stricken team. They’ve combined for 33 points this season, well above a point a game. This is a typical production rate for second-line players whose role is to produce supplementary offence to that of the first.
Of course, the role of a forward extends further than just scoring. Nylander and Tavares have been criticized for other aspects of their game, particularly defensive responsibilities, but it is unfair to lay all of Toronto’s defensive woes on these two.
Despite being one of the top teams in the NHL in total scoring this year, the Maple Leafs have allowed a lot of goals—they’re in the bottom half of the league in goals against. The defensive issues permeate the entire team. The first and second lines have been responsible for equal numbers of turnovers, and Tavares-Nylander even outpace the first line in some defensive stats, including faceoffs and hits.
Critics note the second line often plays five minutes less each game than the first, but what they leave out is the large gap in pay. The higher-paid players like Matthews will always receive more playing time as team management seeks to reap higher return on their expensive investments.
The stats demonstrate so far that Toronto is getting exactly what they are paying for: outstanding scoring from their top-paid players and good scoring from their secondary players.
It should be noted that Nylander has experienced a slight scoring slump in recent weeks, even being benched for the final eight minutes of Toronto’s late February matchup against the Montreal Canadiens (although he bounced back with two pivotal goals against the Calgary Flames). As YouTube personality Steve Dangle said of Nylander, “There is nothing wrong with thinking a good player has more to give and can be even better.”
Nylander and Tavares are not playing poorly—the statistics just don’t support that position. Their numbers just appear poor next to the absurd production of Matthews-Marner. The first-line titans are so big, they make the second-line giants look small.
