Who Has the Better Core Four: Toronto Maple Leafs or Avalanche?

The Toronto Maple Leafs will face the Colorado Avalanche on Saturday night, which brings up the question of: “What team has the better core-four forwards?”

The Toronto Maple Leafs and Colorado Avalanche are almost identical teams this year. Both are built around a core-four of forwards and have a very similar record. The Leafs are 22-8-2, while the Avalanche are 20-8-2.

Both teams have had some of their significant players miss time due to injury, or Covid, but throughout that adversity have played very well. After struggling to find a legit number-one goaltender, Darcy Kuemper seems to be that player for Colorado, as this team finally looks to make that next step in the playoffs.

If we want to look into the future, it wouldn’t be unrealistic to think that these two teams could eventually meet in the Stanley Cup Finals. Obviously the Leafs would have to win a round for the first time since 2004, but they seem to be built for playoff success this year, so you never know what will happen down the road.

However, before we look into the crystal ball and predict the future, let’s look at how these team’s core-four forward’s stack up against each other.

Who Has The Better Core-Four: Avalanche or Toronto Maple Leafs?

Here’s how the Leafs and Avalanche’s core-four’s stack up in salary:

• Toronto Maple Leafs
  • Auston Matthews ($11.634M until 2023-24)
  • John Tavares ($11M until 2024-25)
  • Mitch Marner ($10.93M until 2024-25)
  • William Nylander ($6.9M until 2023-24)
  • Total Spend: $40.464M
• Colorado Avalanche:
  • Mikko Rantanen ($9.25M until 2024-25)
  • Gabriel Landeskog ($7M until 2028-29)
  • Nathan MacKinnon ($6.3M until 2022-23)
  • Nazem Kadri ($4.5M until 2021-22)
  • Total Spend: $27.05 (via: capfriendly.com)

Advantage: Colorado Avalanche spend $13.4M less on salary

Based off salary alone, the Avalanche have a huge advantage on the Leafs. However, the biggest difference is their window to win with that salary.

Kadri’s contract is up after this year and he’s up for a huge pay-bump, while MacKinnon is up after next year. I’d assume that Kadri will make somewhere between $7-8M on his next deal, while MacKinnon will probably make between $11-13M, but even at that salary, they’ll still be less than the Leafs.

So, overall they have a big advantage based on salary on those forwards.

They may have an advantage with salary, but how’s their production been this season?

• Toronto Maple Leafs (2021-22 Season):
  • Auston Matthews (29 Games Played – 20 Goals, 34 Points)
  • John Tavares (31 Games Played – 14 Goals, 34 Points)
  • Mitch Marner (26 Games Played – 6 Goals, 21 Points)
  • William Nylander (32 Games Played – 15 Goals, 35 Points)
  • Total: 118 Games Played – 55 Goals (0.46 GGP) – 124 Points  (1.05 PPG)
• Colorado Avalanche (2021-22 Season)
  • Mikko Rantanen (27 Games Played – 16 Goals, 36 Points)
  • Gabriel Landeskog (25 Games Played – 13 Goals, 33 Points
  • Nathan MacKinnon (20 Games Played – 4 Goals – 33 Points
  • Nazem Kadri (27 Games Played – 12 Goals – 42 points)
  • Total: 99 Games Played – 35 Goals (0.35 GPG) – 144 Points (1.45 PPG) (via: hockeydb.com)

Advantage: Colorado Avalanche have scored 20 more points in 19 less games played

Overall, the Avalanche core-four may not score at a rate as high as the Leafs, but they’re producing 0.40 more points per game, which is a huge margin.

Essentially, the Avalanche’s core-four is more important to their team because they create a lot of goals for the rest of team, while the Leafs core-four is generally producing points only for each other.

Even if the Avalanche’s core-four isn’t scoring goals itself, they’re still able to help other players on the team score goals. However, if the Leafs core-four isn’t scoring goals, it generally means there’s not as many other players on the team scoring, which is interesting.

It all comes back to the salary cap because by paying their core-four players $13M less than the Leafs, it allows them to have two other tremendous players help them score goals, such as Andre Burakovsky at $4.9M and Cale Makar at $9M.

Overall, for this season and probably the foreseeable future, the Avalanche have a better core than the Leafs, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll go further in the playoffs.

Toronto still has an advantage in goaltending and anything can happen in a series. However, it’ll be the toughest match-up for the Leafs as they face the Avalanche for the second time this season.