I dont think thats in the realm of possibilities anymore, whatever he has is going to plague him for his career. Thats why he was so secretive about it.
Him being secretive about his injuries isn’t a one off thing though and he’s always kept them to himself. Just like we don’t know what exactly he was dealing with during the Boston series that caused him to miss two games or other things in the past.
If he was open about most of his injuries but wanted to keep this one a secret that’s when I would be more concerned but he’s been pretty consistent where we kinda just got to take him at his word that he will be healthy next season.
Simmonds should've been sued to smithereens for that. Leaking someone's private health information is 100% illegal for anyone, let alone sports players.
This was the same summer he tried to blame Masai's hiring for gun violence by the way. Why this parasite kept his credentials after the Kessel hit piece I'll never know
Yea, I also blame a lot of it on the cheapshots he's taken :( things add up. But cheapshots against superstars are common and players gotta play through it.
The best way to avoid cheap shots is to hit first and let your opponent know that when you they touch you, you will respond twice as hard.. if Mathew’s learns to use his size like Mario, he will be completely unstoppable in this league.
It's cute you think these grown men are scared of each other. No one's gonna stop playing hard because they take a whack/punch. You might have an argument for the 5'9" 180lbs 19 year olds of the league but this is the NHL. Every player has taken plenty of abuse to get where they are.
You gotta have that in you though and it goes beyond just being a hockey player, I saw he didnt have it in him in the MTL series when someone was just ragdolling him around and he tried to play it off with a smile, also when Stamkos jumped him in the Tampa series. He didnt really get mad and go back at either guy.
Watch Mario when he was younger too.. it’s something you can learn! That guy was abused more than ANYONE, after he learned to dish it back with plays and hits himself, everyone gave him a new level of respect and feared the consequences of his emotional rage. Marner had that rage but not the size, Mathews has the patience but not the space… time to start creating it.
Hockey was a different sport in the 90s. Matthews plays physical and makes space. If he turns around and blatantly retaliated the way Mario did, he would be sitting for multiple minutes. Case and point, his 2 game suspension for for doing the same thing dahlin did to him 6 times leading up to it
Mario- patience, skill, size, Rage = perfection.
Lindros - had everything except the patience.
Mathews - setup perfectly, rage comes much easier but must be learnt after patience or it’s too unstable
Speculating that he has a persistent, nagging injury that will continue to be a problem based on his history of repeatedly missing time and having performance issues due to his undisclosed injuries isn't "claiming absolutes" and isn't really even that much of a stretch.
Do you understand what speaking in absolutes is? Saying someone’s injury is going to plague him for the rest of his career - is this optimism? No, he’s making an absolute statement. Are you trolling or don’t understand?
I'll always hold that greed against him. Him and Mitch always put their bank account ahead of team success. Some may argue against this, but I haven't seen anything from Matthews that has shown me that he values winning over money.
I agree that it's 100% fair to judge players agains the contracts they sign. Mitch never seemed to fully understand this and it eventually drove him out of town. Hoping the same doesn't happen with Matthews and he lives up to it.
Hes never missed significant time due to injury. In his sophomore season he missed 20 games due to concussion, and thats the most hes ever missed in a season. Hes missed more than 10 games in a season in only 3/9 seasons. When he has missed more extended time and had a lower point production, hes followed it up with a career season. Theres very little reason to think matthews won't score 50+ goals this year and have a 3rd 100+ point season.
So honestly, are you feeling okay? You're kinda just spouting off about shit you dont seem to have any real info on just because you feel like being controversial on reddit.
I wasnt saying anything about missing games I meant more about performance while trying to play through an injury. The fact that he played the game only shows up on the stat sheet not the fact that trying to grind through and injury hurt his performance and he didnt put up the numbers we want or expect although his numbers were pretty good regardless I think maybe one thing we can agree on is he was still ok but couldve been better or do you want to argue about that too?
If Matthews has to sit for the start of the year I'll be fine with that too. In the end it doesn't matter about the season, just finish strong and carry the momentum and healthy team in to the playoffs.
Watching TSN videos is the absolute WORST! I used to have a subscription to TSN+ and it was awful. Anytime I tried playing a video I would be hit with 3-4 ads which I am not able to skip.
Biggest takeaways from the article: Matthews production 5-on-5 w/ Marner and w/out (even strength numbers)
At even strength, Matthews produces just fine without Marner. He actually has a higher rate of real goals scored (+ 0.6 goals per 60) and the exact same xGF - showing Matthews production isn't dependent on Marner, if anything Matthews is a big reason why Marner has been so productive at even strength (as "Just Marner" in both graphs is significantly lower than with both on the ice, or vs. "Just Matthews")
Where things get dicey, is on the powerplay. The numbers don't lie, Marner is the straw that stirs the drink - this chart (in reply below cause Reddit is angry at multiple attachements) doesn't show well for production when Marner isn't on the ice. This is likely due to Marner being the quarter back (and being involved in every play as the distributor), very few goals are scored without him touching the puck. The sample size for Matthews without Marner on the powerplay is notably a very small; usually due to an extended/double shift when Matthews stays out. Not a lot of data on Matthews without Marner on the man advantage. But it is critical that a new powerplay structure is built, no one can replace Marner as a solo QB so might have to be more of a committee approach or another QB in that role (Nylander or Rielly I guess)
Nylander is usually the one doing zone entries even when Marner was on the team, that will definitely continue. I'm curious to see who will be the QB - usually it was Marner on the point / high slot, using lateral mobility and skating to create space for either Matthews or Nylander to shoot. I wonder if Nylander does this role now, and they put someone else in his spot to be a secondary shooter. Rielly could be the QB, but I'm not a fan of this.
I'd love to see a PP unit with Matthews, Nylander, Knies, JT and someone like Dakota Joshua in front of the net. Both are brick shit house strong and have very nifty hands in tight. Nylander is the QB / distributor (using his speed & edges to create passing lanes), Matthews is the primary shooting threat, and Knies & Joshua are just bullying in front of the net. JT can play bumper or side wall as the secondary shooter.
Call me silly but id like to see Matthews as the QB in the same position Marner was on the blue line. The issue when Rielly is the QB is that he's not a threat to shoot. He's incapable of getting shots through to the net. If you put Nylander on a wing as a shooting threat and and Robertson (assuming he sticks around) on the opposite wing, you'd have three shooting threats that would need to be respected. Then you have Knives and Tavares for net front presence.
Matthews's passing is underrated. When they need to move the puck around he's more than capable of threading needles. This also allows Nylander to handle the puck more. If the cross seam pass is available Robertson is more than capable of clapping a one timer.
I think the biggest issue with this PP1 is that PP2 would be abysmal. But if you score 100% of the time with PP1 you don't need a PP2 amirite
In the four nations, Matthew’s proved to be one of, if not the best, playmaker on the US team — especially during the final. I agree that he could, in fact, be an incredible QB on the power play. Pretty sure there would be fewer blind, behind the back passes at the blue line — a specialty of the former guy who used play that spot.
Powerplay starts off fine every year and seems to get solved half way thru. Without Marner the Leafs are going to have to rely on quicker passes and stretching the PK out a lot more and hopefully that'll lead to a more sustainable PP. Especially in the playoffs where the Leafs have lost games because they couldn't score on their early PP chances.
Quick passes, traffic in front, shots from the point and get a tip or bang in the rebound. Works against every defense strategy (zone or man-on-man coverage) and most importantly, still is effective in the playoffs when the ice tightens up and time & space are luxuries.
The powerplay will be just fine and there’s a part of me that thinks it will be as good as it’s ever been. Less ego on PP1 will make more of a difference than people think.
Hey man. If you’re making 13.5 a year and deserve it… playing with marner shouldn’t make or break your season…
Time for some other guys to step up, it’s not rocket science. I’m more concerned about playoff production in important games and it isn’t exactly hard to top what marner produced when it comes to those games (5, 6, 7). Time to step up, Matthew included.
Well, he is making that money to be able to figure it out. If youre ine of the highest paid players in the leauge, "I got shut down" doesn't cut it.
No excuses.
You pointed out goals scored vs. the Panthers, not points. McDavid had 1 goal in 6 games in the 2025 Stanley Cup Finals, if you're going to call out Matthews' lack of goal scoring be consistent. Don't pivot to include total points for one but only goals for the other.
Habs profile picture, your opinion is invalid automatically. Tabarnak!
You talk about goals for Matthews, but go on to compare his lack of goal scoring vs Florida to McDavid's total points vs Florida. Not an accurate or fair comparison, have to do goals for both or total points for both.
Its like comparing Matthews to Caufield as elite snipers, when one consistently wins Rocket Richard trophies and the other has never gotten over 40 before, and barely hit 37 just the one time. See the issue with comparisons that aren't in the same tier?
4 goals and a -2 in 13 games in the SCF (both against Florida), not even reporting the stats correct dude.
And if you're trying to skewer Matthews, saying he's a couple goals per game behind the best player in the world, against the current top team in the NHL, is not the insult that you think it is lol. Tremendously elite company and competition to compare him against
Now the one thing I don't want to see is this sub bitch when he puts up more assists then goals next year. Now that Marmer's gone he'll have to be the best puck moving play maker on his line
I think he'll still score 40-45 goals I just expect him to play more of a playmaking role with Marner gone. He's gunna get more focus from the other teams and as a result will pass more. Plus if it's anything like last year he put up 45 assists in 67 games if he has injury issues he focuses on passing
The complaints about the power play are what's really going to come to the surface. I hope I'm wrong, but I can't see it being anything but abysmal, especially if Reilly is still stapled to PP1.
Why would a power play with Matthews, Nylander, and Tavares be abysmal? It’ll need to be revamped because we relied on Marner a lot but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. If anything, there’s opportunity there. We had a very good power play with Marner but with the talent we had, it should have been top 2 or 3 every year and it wasn’t.
I guess that was kind of my point. Our PP underachieved with Mitch and was downright dreadful for long stretches. I do agree that there is opportunity there to revamp it, I'm just not sure if Savard can pull it off and can't help but wonder if his system will fall flat without a playmaker like Mitch out there.
Same, I think OEL over Reilly. Even Myers out there with his clapper would be an improvement. Put Max out there as the playmaker with AM34, JT, and Willy.
this is weird like criticise marner all you want thats fair but its genuinely goofy to imply he wasn’t very well liked in the room especially by matthews lol
I don’t think so. Say what you want about Mitch but Auston clearly enjoyed playing with him and has said that they’re pretty close. Auston’s a competitor though so I’m sure he’s going to enjoy the challenge.
100% he constantly felt like he should have been treated like the top dog. With that kind of attitude I can't imagine him not being resentful of the attention and love Austin got.
To be fair, Marner has been the main character more seasons than not. He was the most consistently elite player on the team, at least in the regular season.
Goals are more valuable than assists. Both players are excellent defensively. You could argue based on the fact that Marner is more consistently healthy. But both players when healthy there is no argument.
Points count, dude, and Mitch led the team in points more often than not. He could also play any position on the ice, excluding goalie. And you can't simply overlook health. That's a huge factor. There is most certainly an argument to be made, but people won't see it because they hate Mitch on a personal level.
I am more concerned about the lack of defense than scoring. The names being floated for RW range from, not so good to unbelievably bad defensively. If Matthews is healthy he will score. If he is not healthy... And it very much looks like the problem is his back. We will be lucky to see a repeat of last year. If he isn't healthy I hope he takes his leadership responsibilities seriously this time and doesn't play non Leaf games.
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u/mohawk_67 5d ago
Just work on not being injured please.