We recently wrote about the changes the Toronto Maple Leafs made on defense this offseason and investigated the acquisition of Chris Tanev to replace the departed TJ Brodie.
Today, we will compare Mark Giordano and Oliver Ekman-Larsson using the same parameters we used for the Tanev/Brodie comparison. We specifically want to determine whether replacing Giordano with Ekman-Larsson is a significant improvement.
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The first thing that is obvious is the age difference. Giordano turned 40 just before the start of last season. Ekman-Larsson will be 33 on July 17. Ekman-Larsson is over seven years younger than Giordano.
Comparing Ekman-Larsson and Giordano’s “Old School” Numbers
The first statistics we will look at are the “Old School” numbers from the 2023-24 regular season:
| Player | GP | TOI | G | A | P | +/- | Hits | Blks | DZS |
| Giordano | 46 | 16:37 | 3 | 6 | 9 | +10 | 51 | 86 | 46.6% |
| Ekman-Larsson | 80 | 18:34 | 9 | 23 | 32 | +10 | 105 | 70 | 42.7% |
There is a big difference in the games each player played last season. Giordano suffered two injuries. The first was an upper-body injury in a game on Nov. 28, 2023. Then, after missing time to deal with his father’s death in March, he suffered a concussion in his second game back on Feb. 29. Once he returned, he struggled to stay in the Maple Leafs lineup. As a result, he only played in 46 games.
Ekman-Larsson missed two games with an upper-body injury suffered against the Buffalo Sabres on April 13.
Last Season, Ekman-Larsson Played More Minutes than Giordano
Ekman-Larsson was a top-pairing and top-four defenseman for his entire NHL career until last season when he signed a one-year deal with the Florida Panthers. With the Panthers, he was relegated to a third-pair role. When Giordano was healthy enough to play, most of this ice time was on the third pair of the Maple Leafs. Despite both players being on the bottom pair of their prospective teams, Ekman-Larsson still played almost two full minutes a game more than Giordano.
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When it comes to offensive abilities, on the surface, it seems like there was no comparison between the two players. The two extra minutes that Ekman-Larsson averaged per game were all on the power play. He scored nine goals to Giordano’s three. He had 23 assists to Giordano’s six. That gives Ekman-Larsson 32 points to Giordano’s six.
Because there is a 34-game difference in their games played, if we extend Giordano’s scoring pace to 80 games to match Ekman-Larsson’s games, Giordano would have had five goals and 16 assists for a total of 21 points. That still gives Ekman-Larsson an 11-point advantage over Giordano. But those 11 points all came on the power play. This basically means that, at five-on-five, the two players scored at virtually the same pace.
Ultimately, we would give Ekman-Larsson the edge regarding offense over Giordano, but not by a lot.
Comparing Ekman-Larsson & Giordano Defensively
It is difficult to compare hits and blocked shots with the difference in games played. We will extend both players’ numbers to an 82-game season to make it easier.
| Player | Hits | Blocks |
| Giordano | 91 | 153 |
| Ekman-Larsson | 108 | 72 |
Ekman-Larsson has the edge in hits, but Giordano blocks shots at over twice the rate that Ekman-Larsson does.
The last statistic on the chart is the zone starts. Both players started the majority of their shifts in the offensive zone. Ekman-Larsson started 57.3% of his shifts in the other team’s end of the rink, compared to Giordano, who started 53.4%.
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The one stat we haven’t mentioned yet is plus/minus. Both players ended up with a plus-10. If we take into account that Ekman-Larsson played 34 more games than Giordano on a team that was a better team than the Maple Leafs and finished at +68 to the Maple Leafs’ +40 in goals for and against, Giordano’s overall effectiveness might have been better than Ekman-Larsson’s. At the very least, the numbers do not conclusively show whether or not one player was significantly better than the other.
Comparing Ekman-Larsson and Giordano Using Advanced Statistics
Let’s see if the analytics show a similar or different picture. Here are the numbers for each player’s on-ice, five-on-five offense. [Here are the full names for the hockey analytics abbreviations: GF: Goals For; Per60: Per 60 minutes of play; xGF: Expected Goals For; SCF: Scoring Chances For; and, HDSCF: High Danger Scoring Chances For.]
| Player | Min | GF | Per60 | xGF | Per60 | SCF | Per60 | HDSCF | Per60 |
| Giordano | 629.6 | 32 | 3.05 | 31 | 2.95 | 359 | 34.2 | 150 | 14.3 |
| Ekman-Larsson | 1130.9 | 49 | 2.60 | 53 | 2.81 | 548 | 29.1 | 223 | 11.8 |
Those numbers indicate Giordano had a more positive effect on the Maple Leafs offensive play than Ekman-Larsson did for the Panthers. Toronto was the better offensive team, however. The Maple Leafs scored 38 more goals than Florida. We must also remember that Ekman-Larrson started 4% more shifts in the opposition’s zone than Giordano. There is nothing here to give either player a distinct advantage.
How about defense? [Here are the full names for those hockey analytics abbreviations: GA: Goals Against; Per60: Per 60 minutes of play; xGA: Expected Goals Against; SCA: Scoring Chances Against; and HDSCA: High Danger Scoring Chances Against]
| Player | Min | GA | Per60 | xGA | Per60 | SCA | Per60 | HDSCA | Per60 |
| Giordano | 629.6 | 25 | 2.38 | 26.5 | 2.53 | 258 | 24.6 | 112 | 10.7 |
| Ekman-Larsson | 1130.9 | 40 | 2.12 | 44.3 | 2.35 | 443 | 23.5 | 209 | 11.1 |
There is not much difference in the two players’ on-ice five-on-five numbers for defense, either. Ekman-Larsson has a slight edge in every category except High-Danger Scoring Chances Against, where Giordano had the edge. Just as we felt it was important to mention that the Maple Leafs were the better offensive team and that their overall numbers could have positively affected Giordano’s offensive stats, we must mention that the Panthers were the superior defensive team. Florida gave up 63 fewer goals than the Maple Leafs. That could have affected Ekman-Larsson’s defensive numbers.
Comparing Ekman-Larsson vs. Giordano During the Postseason
The advantage goes to Ekman-Larsson regarding playoff performance because Giordano was a scratch and didn’t play a game for the Maple Leafs in the postseason. Meanwhile, Ekman-Larsson played 24 games for the Panthers, scored two goals, added six assists for eight points, and was plus-1 in plus/minus. He will also bring a Stanley Cup ring when he steps on the ice for the Maple Leafs.
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During the postseason, Ekman-Larsson played in a purely third-pairing role. He also saw his ice time shrink by three minutes per game to 15:27. That said, playing that role for the Stanley Cup-winning team sure beats not playing at all for a team that was knocked out in the first round.
The Bottom Line Comparison Between Ekman-Larsson and Giordano
Because Ekman-Larsson is seven years younger than Giordano and still has a few years left in him, even if it is in a bottom-pairing role, we have to conclude that he is a step up from Giordano. But Ekman-Larsson did not put up much better numbers than Giordano when they were on the ice. It’s just that Ekman-Larsson was on the ice a lot more, and his team won it all with him in the lineup. But this is not the same game-changing move as replacing Brodie with Tanev.
As for this coming season, the question is, where will Ekman-Larsson fit into the Maple Leafs’ lineup? The most likely spot seems to be on the left side of the third pair (he is a lefty). After that, it is a matter of who he gets partnered with. Three present candidates are Timothy Liljegren, Jani Hakanpaa, and Conor Timmins.
With Ekman-Larsson being one season removed from being a top-four defenseman and the Maple Leafs not having a clear-cut top-four defenseman to play the left side, he could find himself on the left side of the second pair. If that were to happen, we have to think that with Morgan Rielly and Chris Tanev making up the first pair, Ekman-Larsson’s most likely partner on the second pair would be Jake McCabe.
We will have to see how it all plays out.
[Note: I want to thank long-time Maple Leafs fan Stan Smith for collaborating with me on this post. Stan’s Facebook profile can be found here.]
