Toronto Maple Leafs: Media Hysteria Hides ‘Best Team’ Status

The Toronto Maple Leafs entered the NHL’s new season in what surely is the most unique situation ever.

Losers of six straight opening-round playoff series, and occupying the centre of the hockey universe (with the baggage and media nonsense that entails)the Toronto Maple Leafs happen to have one of the best rosters ever assembled in the NHL’s Salary Cap Era, and yet they get the respect of a busted lip-syncing pop star.

That’s OK.

Whenever I read something stupid about my favorite hockey team, I just remember that Ed Sheeran has sold more records than Morrissey.

I recall that  Avatar ( My Review: zero stars) sold more tickets in it’s opening weekend that David Lynch has sold in his entire career.

I recall my second-favorite quote. 

And when I am centered, I get down to the business of telling all of y’all how it is.

Toronto Maple Leafs Sit in the Cat Seat

Though I’m hearing a ton of nonsense, if you ignore the noise, the Leafs are exactly what I’ve been saying all summer long: The best team in hockey.

They have a 4-3 record, and all three of their losses were games they could have won. Not saying they deserved to, but this team has won nearly 70% of the points available to them over three years, and the reason they win so often is that Matthews and Marner allow them to win a lot of games they don’t necessarily deserve to win.

Despite playing as well as ever, neither player is contributing as much as they normally would, which is understandable, because these things happen.

It’s a long season, and not every single game can see a max-effort performance.  The game against Vegas was garbage, but one total dud out of seven games is actually not a bad ratio, and that was also a winnable game, thanks to Illya Samsonov. 

Auston Matthews Will Eventually Contribute

For the first 414 games of his career, Auston Matthews scored on over 16% of his shots. (naturalstattrick.com).

This season, despite leading the NHL in 5v5 shots and being 3rd in shots overall (maybe not after last night’s slate of games, but after the last game he played) Matthews is shooting about 3%.

His Expected Goals rating is actually higher than last years, so lets consider that he has been powerfully unlucky to start the season, and that if he scores at even half his normal rate, the Leafs are likely 5-2, 6-1 or even 7-0.

This makes all criticism relating to the start of this season absolutely ridiculous. Note: Toronto and Colorado are both 4-3 while Tampa is 3-4.  You know what Frankie says.

The funniest thing about the horrible analysis that Leafs fans have been mostly subjected to  for the last three season is that it’s relentlessly negative, and anything that could paint the team in a positive light gets ignored.

Such as:

• Columbus had to set an NHL Record for save percentage in a series to beat them (98% 5v5).
• Montreal beat them when Tavares played for 2 minutes out of 7 games, and Matthews was unable to shoot the puck.
• Tampa beat them despite being outplayed.  The Leafs fourth win was discounted by a blown call, and the best goalie in the world played maybe the best game of his career in game seven to beat them.

These kind of bad breaks should unite us behind the team, but the reach of the likes of Jeff O’Neil and Nick Kypreos is such that their (I have to believe intentionally) bad takes set the tone of how people view this team.