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Best player on the Toronto Maple Leafs?

May 26, 2020, 12:47 PM ET [25 Comments]
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In this edition of the hotstove, we share our choices for best player on the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Todd Cordell

Auston Matthews.

He’s been the best, and most efficient, 5v5 goal scorer since the day he entered the league. His passing is excellent, his puck skills are excellent, and his defensive game is growing leaps and bounds. I think he is going to contend for hardware every season for the foreseeable future.

Honorable mention goes to William Nylander. I know everybody likes to cherry pick sequences where it looks like he’s checked out. People like to say Kyle Dubas overpaid him. He didn’t. Nylander is an elite – yes, elite – offensive talent who brings more to the table defensively, and in the corners, than people give him credit for.

Mitch Marner largely gets recognized as the defensively responsible star winger. Well, it just so happens that the Leafs give up shots, chances, expected goals, and actual goals at a higher rate with him on the ice than Nylander. Imagine that.

James Tanner

The Toronto Maple Leafs best player is Auston Matthews, and he is the best 5v5 goal scorer in the NHL (which makes him the best goal scorer in the NHL) and has been since he was a rookie.

Matthews had an incredible season that should win him the Hart Trophy, but won't, because people put too much emphasis on point totals. Fact is, Draisaitl doesn't actually help his team that much at even-strength, and Matthews numbers are superior to MacKinnons. He is the Leafs best player and in a just society where the correct answer was assured, he would win the Hart Trophy.

The crazy thing is, however, that despite the presence of John Tavares and Mitch Marner on the Leafs, their second best player (at least this year) is William Nylander, whose peripheral stats put him at the top of the league. The Hart Trophy numbers that Matthews put up are just slightly lower in Nylander's case, but still very good. IF these two went on a PDO bender, they could easily end up near the top of the NHL's scoring list. Nylander's underlying numbers are incredible and he might be the most underappreciated player in the NHL.

Sean Maloughney

Okay, clearly the answer to this question is Auston Matthews who is an elite goalscorer and a top 20 player in the NHL right now. Instead of picking the obvious I am instead going to throw a hypothetical into the ring.

The best player on the Toronto Maple Leafs is the player who will (eventually) help the team get past Boston in the playoffs.

Now I'm not suggesting that this pandemic was started by the Leafs as a way to avoid having to face off against the Bruins. Toronto would face off against the Blue Jackets for the play in but the real first round could still see them face off against Boston so clearly that theory doesn't hold up.

The goal of every team is to win the Cup so whichever player on the Leafs scores the goal that propels Toronto past Boston and into the next round will become the de facto best player. Personally I'm going to vote for Cody Ceci earning this esteemed title.

Numbers via NaturalStatTrick.com

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