Some things have simply not gone right for the Toronto Maple Leafs this season, despite the overall success. Significant injuries to Auston Matthews and Anthony Stolarz, a myriad of minor injuries to other significant pieces (John Tavares, Matthew Knies, Jake McCabe to name a few), an expected lack of scoring from the bottom-six, and a seemingly major step backward by longtime blue line star Morgan Rielly. After seven straight seasons of producing at least 0.57 points per game, Rielly has struggled mightily in the first 60-ish percent of the Maple Leafs’ season, having produced just 23 points (five goals, 18 assists) in 52 games — the worst 82-game-pace since he was 22 years old. Is this a product of bad play, though, or is it more so an issue of deployment and bad luck?
Deployment Questionable at Best
As a part of new head coach Craig Berube‘s staff, ex-Calgary Flames assistant head coach Marc Savard took over the power play, and the results just haven’t been where they should be considering the talent on the roster. They currently sit middle of the pack with a 22.5% power play percentage (PP%), which seems like a strange thing to complain about, but when the roster includes Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander, and Tavares, one would expect them to be around the top of the league in this regard. Part of the reason it hasn’t been is that the fifth player, rather than a proven quarterback who has had a plethora of power play success in Rielly, has been a forward — usually Knies. This slotted Marner, who is at his best when he is doling passes out on the flanks on a power play, relegated to quarterback duties.
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Admittedly, the underlying metrics have been middling with Rielly over Knies as the fifth player. Still, the results last season (with Rielly as the quarterback) were better than the on-ice results this season — a 24.0 PP% as compared to the 22.5% this season. Obviously, this trickled down to Rielly’s box score as well — he has just nine points on the power play through 52 games (a 14-point pace in a full season) as opposed to the 21, 18, and 25 man-advantage points he produced in the previous three seasons.
On top of that, he’s simply getting fewer minutes than he’s used to — in fact, he’s playing the fewest minutes per game in his career since 2014-15, at 21:27. This is in part thanks to the Maple Leafs’ overall stronger blue line that is less reliant on Rielly being the only puck-moving defenceman, and also directly relates to how many points he’s producing. Outside of the 2022-23 season, Rielly is playing two minutes fewer than he has per game this season versus each of the last seven seasons. Of course, spending less time on the ice with the superstars is going to result in fewer points.
Some Metrics Dictate That His Box Score Is Just Unlucky
It’s easy to look at his box score — one that shows middling point production and a jarring plus/minus of minus-19 (though that statistic really isn’t individualized and I would argue has no real meaning in the sport) — and say that Rielly’s having an atrocious season. Perhaps he’s slowing down because of his age, but the underlying metrics suggest that he’s also a product of some bad luck.
Predominantly, his PDO is a glaring red flag (or green flag, I suppose) in terms of his box score output. PDO, simply put, is a metric that measures on-ice “puck luck” by combining a player’s on-ice shooting percentage (oiSH%) and on-ice save percentage (oiSV%). This works because, league-wide, these two numbers will always combine to 1.000 — either a puck goes in the back of the net or it doesn’t. If a player has a PDO well below 1.000, they’re considered extremely unlucky and their points will probably positively regress back to the mean. If a PDO is well above 1.000, the opposite is true. Rielly’s PDO this season is .988, which, despite not necessarily sounding very different, is notably low. His oiSV% is fine, at .914, but he and his teammates are shooting just 7.33% with him on the ice, which, considering he mainly plays with the superstars, will rise and will result in his point production rising as well.
His other underlying metrics are strong, too. He has an expected goals share (xGF%) above 50%, a scoring chance share (SCF%) of 51.11%, and a positive shot share (SF%) too. It isn’t like he’s getting outplayed on the ice. In fact, these metrics were all worse last season, a season in which Rielly had 58 points in 72 games.
Positive Regression Is Coming
All this is to say that Rielly’s defamation is semi-unwarranted. Yes, the points are not where fans would like them to be, and it’s understandable to be reactionary to a relatively jarring change for a player who has produced about 0.75 points per game in the previous three campaigns. Still, the underlying metrics reveal that the on-ice product is weaker than it should be, and that, combined with his lack of significant power play time, has led to the minimal point production that has been seen this season. Better things are coming for the veteran blueliner.
