There's just something about Auston Matthews facing the Chicago Blackhawks that makes him want to put his ear to the crowd.
When Matthews scored the game-tying goal in the third period, he put his hand to his ear gesturing to the crowd to "make more noise" which is pretty embarassing to do to your own fanbase. If you flashback seven years ago to an incredible regular season game on Oct. 7, 2018 against Chicago, Matthews did the same thing when he scored a go-ahead goal gesturing more that "I can't hear you", before Patrick Kane did the same thing back to him when he tied the game.
The reason why Matthews reacted like this was because a few minutes prior, Leafs fans were booing the team for thier poor effort. Midway through the third period the team was down 2-0 and looked lifeless. In fairness, the fans paid a ton of money to watch what they thought was Connor Bedard versus their beloved blue-and-white, but instead turned into a brutal effort against a Bedard-less Blackhawks team, who doesn't have much other talent.
If I had paid to see that effort, I would have been booing with the rest of the group as the Leafs looked like the worst teams in the league and Matthews didn't have a shot on net until he eventually scored the tying goal. It ended up being his only shot on net, so it's pretty insane that he was giving the fanbase so much crap, despite playing terrible all night.
Matthews's gesture should be very worrisome to the future of this franchise
If you just looked at the box score, you would have seen a two-point performance by William Nylander and Matthews, including goals from Dakota Joshua and Oliver Ekman-Larsson, so it wouldn't seem like a cry for help, but if it wasn't for a 10 second stretch in the third period, the Leafs should have lost this game handedly.
As much as players say they don't listen to the media, they clearly know what is being said about them and Matthews' goal, in my opinion, was a big "screw you" to the media and fanbase who has been bashing him, which in one way is great, but in another way is kind of sad. When you play in the Toronto market, you should never let the noise get to you, but in this case, it almost feels like the noise is getting to the captain, as it's the first time in his career that he is taking all the blame, as that blaming has typically been put on Mitch Marner.
This win was so much fun, but Matthews' gesture makes me very pessimistic about his mindset and the future of this team because if they continue to play the way they did for 90 percent of that game against the Blackhawks, this team is in serious trouble.