Toronto Maple Leafs: Nazem Kadri Excels at Effectiveness
The Toronto Maple Leafs and Nazem Kadri are a perfect fit.
For years, Kadri was overlooked, but since Mike Babcock took over the reigns and started coaching the Toronto Maple Leafs, his career has taken off.
He’s a player that you’d love to have on your team but would hate to play against, the only difference between a guy like Kadri and most other players in the NHL that fit the description above is that Kadri has elite potential.
You read that right.
We’ve seen flashes of his brilliant play over the years, most notably was his end to end dangle against the Philadelphia Flyers where he made the opposition look silly.
There’s no better word to describe it and I have no regrets with the video I linked, I thought it was funny.
However, he’s being utilized as a shutdown center, playing against the toughest matchups every game and he’s excelling at it.
Better yet, during the 2016-17 season, Kadri’s first in that role, he produced 32 goals and 61 points, a career-high in both categories and just remember that he was playing a shutdown role.
Flash forward to this season and nothing’s changed.
A Thorn Who Scores
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That’s going to be his new tagline, a thorn who scores and it’s true.
He’s a pest, there’s no doubt about it, but he’s a pest who does right 90% of the time and he does it better than anyone else, whether that’s drawing penalties, shutting down players like Connor McDavid (you remember that from last season) or scoring goals, he can do it all.
Through 10 games played this season, he’s scored four goals and nine points (two PPG and one PPA) and you know what else?
His faceoff win percentage is the highest it’s ever been at 54.11 and yes, faceoffs matter, they really do.
If you’re curious as to which team has the best FOW% then look no further because it’s the Leafs with 54.2% of all faceoffs being won.
Sidetrack
Click the link, look it up for yourself and I’ll just stop anyone now that wants to argue against my case with the logic that teams like the St. Louis Blues and Tampa Bay Lightning are near the bottom of that list, but are in the top five for points.
Just remember that I’m the one that brought it up and hyperlinked it before you start trying to poke any holes.
To eliminate that discussion, I’ll just say that there’s no direct correlation to winning draws and winning hockey games because clearly the Blues and Lightning can’t do that former all too much, but can do the latter.
On the other hand, it doesn’t hurt to win more draws and to gain possession of the puck earlier to increase the chance of scoring a goal.
Makes sense, right?
Wow, I’m off topic, anyways, Kadri’s playing great hockey, my guess is that he’s going to amass 30 goals and 70 points.
Looking forward to reading your thoughts on this.