By the Numbers: The Best Maple Leafs 2020-21 Offensive D-man?

The seven defensemen who’ll be compared in this review will be T.J. Brodie, Morgan Rielly, Justin Holl, Jake Muzzin, Travis Dermott, Zach Bogosian, and Rasmus Sandin. 

Comparison One: Main Category One: Shot Generation

(Acronyms TOI (time on ice), CF (Corsi For), Per 60 (shot attempts per 60 minutes)

Sub-category (a): Corsi For (or Shot Attempts)

Rank	Name	Time on Ice	Corsi For	Per 60 Min
1	Muzzin	940	887	56.4
2	Bogosian	576.5	528	55.0
3	Sandin	111	98	53.0
4	Holl	969	852	52.8
5	Rielly	1050	920	52.6
6	Brodie	1032.5	899	52.2
7	Dermott	636.5	545	51.4

Sub-category (b): Shots on Net

Rank	Name	Time on Ice	Shots	Per 60 Min
1	Sandin	111	887	32.4
2	Muzzin	940	528	31.5
3	Bogosian	576.5	98	31.1
4	Holl	969	852	29.4
5	Dermott	636.5	920	29.1
6	Rielly	1050	899	28.7
7	Brodie	1032.5	545	28.7

Sub-category (c): Total Points, and Ranking for Shot Generation

Rank	Name	Corsi For	Shots	Total
1	Muzzin	10	9	19
2	Sandin	8	10	18
3	Bogosian	9	8	17
4	Holl	7	7	14
5	Rielly	6	5	11
6	Brodie	5	5	10
7	Dermott	4	6	10

By the Numbers Summary:

By the numbers, Jake Muzzin ranked first first in Corsi and second in actual shots, which puts him at the top of the Shot Generation portion of the Offense by Defense, with 19 points. 

Rasmus Sandin: Ranking ranked first in shots and third in Corsi and finishes in second place in this ranking. Contextually, however, it’s important to remember that Sandin only played 111 minutes played 5-on-5, so small sample, and his minutes are bottom pairing, and sheltered. 

Zach Bogosian: Bogosian is a surprise. Most fans consider Bogosian a stay-at-home physical defenseman who has never produced much offensively at any level he’s even played. The majority of his ice time comes on the bottom pair, so he’s usually not facing the opposition’s best players. At the same time, he’s also playing with bottom six players. Bogosian shows better than 

Justin Holl:  Holl does play against top-six players, and with top-six players.  Being middle of the pack, for what he earns is good.

Morgan Rielly: Here is another surprise. Rielly is supposed to be the Leafs best offensive defenseman, and he plays a lot with the Maple Leafs top offensive players. We would expect him to have better shot generation numbers. 

TJ Brodie:  Brodie is usually glued to Rielly’s hip, and he is there to take care of the defensive things. His shot generation numbers being similar to Rielly’s makes sense.

Travis Dermott: Travis finishes the shot generation part of this tied with Brodie for last. It is interesting that he finished last in Corsi, but was two spots better when it came to actual shots. 

Scoring Chance Generation

Scoring Chances For

Rank	Name	Time on Ice	Scoring Chances For	Per 60 Min
1	Muzzin	940	499	31.9
2	Rielly	1050	551	31.5
3	Brodie	1032.5	527	30.6
4	Bogosian	576.5	285	29.7
5	Sandin	111	54	29.2
6	Holl	969	467	28.9
7	Dermott	636.5	295	27.8

High Danger Scoring Chances For

Rank	Name	Time on Ice	HDSCF	Per 60 Min
1	Sandin	111	24	13.0
2	Bogosian	576.5	123	12.8
3	Rielly	1050	219	12.5
4	Brodie	1032.5	208	12.1
5	Muzzin	940	185	11.8
6	Holl	969	187	11.6
7	Dermott	636.5	195	11.5

Total Points for Scoring Chances Generated

Rank	Name	SCF	HDSCF	Per 60 Min
1	Rielly	9	8	17
2	Muzzin	10	6	16
2	Bogosian	7	9	16
2	Sandin	6	10	16
5	Brodie	8	7	15
6	Holl	5	5	10
7	Dermott	4	4	8

Summary Notes

Morgan Rielly: Now this is more what we expect from Rielly. While he was down the list in Shots Generated, here he is #2 in Scoring Chances, and #3 in High Danger Scoring Chances, giving him first place in this section. In a way this makes sense. Similar to Marner, Rielly is a past first player, and rarely shoots. We could see that resulting in less overall shots, but more scoring chances. 

Jake Muzzin: First in Scoring Chances, but fifth in High Danger Scoring Chances. This kind of matches the eye test, as we don’t often see Muzzin deep in the zone. He will venture in to pinch, but usually returns back to the point. He will take shots from there, but rarely goes into the high danger scoring areas.

Zach Bogosian: Surprise again. Here he is once again near the top of an offensive category. It makes us wonder if he gives the players around him the confidence to attack offensively, while he takes care of defense.  

Rasmus Sandin:  He is the opposite of Muzzin, fifth in Scoring Chances, first in High Danger Chances. Again, keep in mind, this is a very small sample.  

TJ Brodie: Brodie is middle-of-the-road in Scoring Chances overall. The numbers in this category are really close, and he is only two points behind Rielly,

Justin Holl: He is not on the ice for his offense, so his numbers here make sense.

Travis Dermott: Dermott is last in Shots and last in Scoring Chances. Dermott does not show much offensively to this point. 

Goals  For / Expected Goals For.

Rank	Name	Time on Ice	Goals For	Per 60 Min
1	Sandin	111	8	4.3
2	Muzzin	940	52	3.3
3	Brodie	1032.5	55	3.2
4	Holl	969	48	3.0
5	Rielly	1050	50	2.9
6	Bogosian	576.5	26	2.7
7	Dermott	636.5	19	1.8

Expected Goals For

Rank	Name	Time on Ice	XGF	Per 60 Min
1	Muzzin	940	60.5	3.9
2	Brodie	1032.5	65.5	3.8
3	Holl	969	53.9	3.3
4	Rielly	1050	44.8	2.6
5	Bogosian	576.5	24	2.5
6	Sandin	111	4.4	2.4
7	Dermott	636.5	24	2.3

Total Points for Goals and Expected Goals For

Rank	Name	GF	XGF	Points
1	Muzzin	9	10	19
2	Brodie	8	9	17
3	Holl	7	8	15
3	Sandin	10	5	15
5	Rielly	6	7	13
6	Bogosian	5	6	11
7	Dermott	4	4	8

Summary Notes

Jake Muzzin: Second in Goals For and first in Expected Goals For. That puts Muzzin second in actual offensive production, and first in expected offensive production.  

TJ Brodie:  Third in Goals For and second in Expected Goals For. Brodie fares much better when it comes to results, and expected results than he does in the generation of Shots and Scoring Chances.

Justin Holl: Holl is also much higher in the results than in his generation of shots or chances. 

Rasmus Sandin: It’s curious that Sandin finishes first in actual goals, but second last in expected goals. Is there some luck involved here?

Morgan Rielly: Not great in Shots. Really good in Scoring Chances. But he’s not so great in results and expected results.

Zach Bogosian: Third in shots, tied for second in scoring chances, but Bogosian takes a big tumble in results and expected results. 

Travis Dermott:  Shots? Last. Scoring Chances? Last. Goals and Expected Goals? Last. The 2020-21 season was definitely not a good one offensively for Dermott. At least, the numbers don’t love him.

Overall Total Points and Rankings for Offense From the Maple Leafs’ Defense 5-on-5 for the 2020-21 Season

Rank	Name	Shots	Scoring Chances	Goals	Total Points
1	Muzzin	19	16	19	54
2	Sandin	18	16	15	49
3	Bogosian	17	16	11	44
4	Brodie	10	15	17	42
5	Rielly	11	17	13	41
6	Holl	14	10	15	39
7	Dermott	10	8	8	26

Summary Notes

Jake Muzzin: First in offense from defense this season. He’s a consistent offensive generator.

Rasmus Sandin: He improves from sixth last year to second this year.  He played three times the minutes last season than he did this season.  If he would have played the same amount this year would his numbers go down?  We really can’t say. 

Zach Bogosian: While his results weren’t great, he still finished third overall for offense as a defenseman. Is this an outlier, or is Bogosian quietly better offensively than he shows with the eye test?

Morgan Rielly: We think this is the most interesting result of all. Last season, when Rielly played hurt for most of the season, he lost his role on the power-play to Tyson Barrie. It was thought that Rielly had struggled offensively; however, he finished on top for offense from the defensemen. This season he was  healthy and, by the eye test, he played better offensively. Yet, he drops to fourth in offensive stats.  

TJ Brodie: Because Rielly and Brodie were tied to each other most of the season, it makes sense that they finish in a virtual tie offensively.

Justin Holl: Holl ranked fifth last season with 34 points and sixth this season with 39. We would have to say offensively this feels about right for Jake. 

Travis Dermott. According to our ranking system, Dermott has 28 points last season and 26 points this season. He’s been at or near the bottom offensively both seasons. He’s consistently been last on the team both seasons.