The Reason for Auston Matthews of the Maple Leafs’ Late Loss…

Auston Matthews, the franchise center for the Toronto Maple Leafs, has not played as well as he has this season, at least not in comparison to the scorching goal pace he has put up. He has only managed two goals and four total points in that time, for a total of 54 and 80 over 63 games. Matthews would have scored 20 goals in 82 games if he averaged two goals per eight games, which is somewhat scary given the amazing 77-goal pace he was repping prior to the downturn. His underlying statistics have also somewhat declined, suggesting that this may be more than just a run of bad luck.

Subsequent Data Indicate Retrogression
While Matthews’ underlying numbers throughout this period haven’t been poor—in reality, they’ve been quite the opposite—he has also witnessed a little decline in success in this area. Using his anticipated goals share (xGF%) as an example, he now ranks second among Maple Leafs forwards with at least 30 games played this season with an xGF% of 54.44%. It has decreased to 53.94% in his previous eight games, which is only 0.5% below his season average but ranks sixth among forwards. This indicates to me that even though the team is performing better overall, he is playing worse. It is reasonable to anticipate and hope that a team’s star player will be dominating the league when