The Toronto Maple Leafs top prospect is not going to play in the World Junior Championship.
Because the tournament would prevent him from attending the Toronto Maple Leafs training camp, Nick Robertson isn’t going to the WJC. I think this means it is reasonable to assume he’s going to play on the Leafs this year.
First, he can only play in the OHL or the NHL, and assuming there is an OHL season, it may not even include body checking. Robertson scored over 55 goals in 46 games, which are nice, but also indicate that he is too good for the league. If you want to be a pro, you aren’t going to get any better dominating inferior players.
If the Leafs didn’t think he’d make the team, you have to think they’d have wanted him to play in the WJC. Therefore, I think its a safe bet that he is on the team.
And if he’s on the team, he’s a Calder Candidate.
Nick Robertson and the Toronto Maple Leafs
The Leafs have only ever won a single Calder Trophy in the modern era, and that was Auston Matthews in 2016. Robertson’s competition this year will be pretty tough though: Alexis Lafreniere will be the odds-on favorite, but there is also Bowen Byram in Colorado, and Quinton Byfield of the Kings or Kirill Kaprizov of the Wild (who should finally arrive in the NHL this year).
The Rangers’s goalie, nine different guys on the Senators…..there’s a lot of options, but Robertson shouldn’t be discounted. Unlike all those other players, he’ll actually be on a good team.
Assuming he’s on the Leafs, he should be their #1 option on the second-power play unit, bashing off one timers and sick wrist shots just like Matthews will do on the first unit.
That alone should let him flirt with the 20 goal mark, and 30 isn’t going to be that far fetched if he gets ice time with John Tavares on the second line, which I think is a good possibility.
Some teams might artificially suppress a rookie, especially when contending. But the Leafs are a data driven team, and if Nick Robertson is better than Wayne Simmonds, Zach Hyman or Ilya Mikheyev (which he likely will be) then they’ll deploy him as such.
One reason why I like Robertson’s chances is that the Leafs already have 3 guys who should flirt with a 40 goal pace (Tavares, Nylander and, obviously, Mattthews) and Robertson should get a lot of easy looks, at least early on.
If paired with Matthews and Marner, defenses would be at a loss to deal with two of the best shots the NHL has to offer on one line.
If placed lower in the lineup, the Leafs could just swarm teams by sending out line after line featuring an offensive weapon. Picture it, you just kept Matthews and Tavares off the board in back-to-back shifts, you throw your fourth line over the boards, and the Leafs counter with a volume shooter who has one of the best shots in the world.
However he’s deployed, he’s going to be getting easier minutes than players like Lafreniere who will start his NHL career as the player teams who face the Rangers try the hardest to stop.
That’s why I like Nick Robertson for the Calder.