For people up in arms about Nylander with Kadri...

That is just categorically untrue. I honestly don't know where to begin, but I will try.

1) League is packed full of players who don't have finishing skills. Zach Hyman is the immediately example. Yet no one in their right mind would argue he is not an NHLer.

2) Lets use an underlying stat that apparently doesn't matter to you as an example. Corsi being percentage of shot attempts for vs against. Say 1 particular Leaf on 1 night, generates 20 shots for while he is on the ice (it doesn't necessarily mean he took the shot), and only 5 against on the same night. Now say he does the same for 10 nights in a row. That means for 5 nights, the ice is tilted for the Leafs in that on average, every shot the opposing team takes, Leafs take 4. Granted, this is unrealistically lopsided, but just throwing this example to paint a clearer picture. When the team is outchancing the opposition, it generally means not only do the Leafs have more chances but by always having the puck, they're preventing the other team from scoring as well.

Now, there's other factors sure, such as quality of teammates carrying the rest of the line. But a player who can generate positive corsi night in and night out is a player who statistically should be generating overall net positives.

So the fact that a player like Willie is not scoring points while consistently generating positive corsi, means he is rolling a dice trying to hit a 6 repeatedly and not doing so. You can't reasonably expect someone to keep rolling the dice and never doing so.

Better example, say a multiple choice test with choices from a to e where you absolutely don't know any of the answers. There's 20 questions. The probability of getting nothing right with random guessing is a little over 1% (if my math checks out).

Apply this to Willie's career points percentage (14.9% as of right now, rounding down to 14% for argument sake and because I'm lazy). Its a little more complicated as generating a chance that's leads to a goal doesn't always lead a point. But anyway, say it does for now (plus the odds of THAT is pretty uncommon) If he generates 20 scoring chances 1 night, whether with passing or shooting, the odds of him not getting a point is less than 5% (but again, quality of linemates will affect this number, when he plays with Brown or Marleau, I assume its much lower than 14%)

TLDR: what his results are vs the number of chances he's generating is an outlier. It's not normal. Until he does this for a big enough sample size vs his career, you cannot judge use the last 15 games to judge whether he is a good player.

/r/leafs Thread Parent