Amidst struggling Toronto Maple Leafs D-corps, Morgan Rielly playing his best defense yet

Morgan Rielly has sometimes fallen under the radar in terms of evaluating the Toronto Maple Leafs’ main core of players. He lacks the league-wide prominence at the level of Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and John Tavares despite the fact that Rielly is the only current Leaf who has been on the team longer than any of them. In fact, his 736 games played is by far the most of any active Leaf and ranks 13th in franchise history, only three games behind Bob Baun for 12th and 41 behind Tie Domi for 11th.

Rielly hasn’t exactly been a franchise-level defenseman that many Stanley Cup winners strive to have on their bluelines like Alex Pietrangelo, Cale Makar, Victor Hedman, Kris Letang, Duncan Keith, Drew Doughty, and many more. But Rielly has proven to be an excellent offensive defenseman who will only minimally hurt you defensively when partnered with a strong defensive defenseman, and since the Leafs signed T.J. Brodie in 2020, Rielly has had just that by his side.

But never has he been a strong defensive defenseman in his own right, which is where his detractors have (rightfully) criticized him and prevented him from being in that next tier of defensemen. When he signed his eight-year contract with a $7.5 million cap hit, that added fuel to the flames and sometimes led to conversations about whether they should have moved on from him. The fact that he struggled at times in the 2022-23 regular season, his first of his new deal, didn’t help either.

But then something changed in the 2023 playoffs. Rielly hit a whole new gear offensively, with four goals, eight assists, and 12 points in 11 playoff games, and it played a big role in the team winning their first playoff series in 19 years. It felt like every goal he scored was clutch too: one in overtime of Game 3 of the first round, one to tie the 4-1 comeback in Game 4, another to open the scoring in Game 5 when the Leafs had a chance to win the series, and the final one to start the 2-0 comeback in Game 5 of the second round when the Leafs were on the brink of elimination.

His game saw a big change defensively as well in those playoffs, as his 57.42% 5v5 expected goal share ranked fifth among defensemen with 200 minutes played in the playoffs. Only Jaccob Slavin and Brent Burns were playing top-pair minutes of the four defensemen ahead of him, and his 2.24 5v5 expected goals against (xGA) per 60 minutes was seventh in that same group, with only Brayden McNabb and Shea Theodore playing similar types of roles as Rielly’s. The Leafs were a good defensive team regardless in the playoffs (Brodie was 8th in 5v5 expected goals against per 60 with 2.25 and Jake McCabe was 10th with 2.5), but Rielly didn’t stick out like a sore thumb anymore on that blueline.

Ok, so maybe it was a flash in the pan, a brief stretch where Rielly played out of his mind. Worse players have played better in only 11 games, maybe that’s just all that is. Well, 2023-24 Rielly begs to differ so far.

Among defensemen with 200 minutes at 5v5, Rielly currently sits 74th in 5v5 xGA per 60 with 2.6. That doesn’t quite jump off the page, but when you look at the same group of defenders’ stats relative to their team’s performance when they aren’t on the ice, Rielly jumps up to a 35th with a -0.3 5v5 xGA per 60 relative to his teammates. And for the record, negative is good in this case, as it means that he’s allowing fewer chances against.

That context is important, because his 2.6 5v5 xGA per 60 this season is only the fourth lowest of his career, with better seasons in 2015-16, 2020-21 and 2021-22. Why should this be considered his best defensive season when, by that rate stat, it’s only his fourth best?

First, let’s circle back to the relative stats. If you look at those 2015-16, 2020-21 and 2021-22 seasons that Rielly performed better in, it was due to playing in a team environment that was playing excellent defense. While that 2015-16 team finished last place and got Matthews as a result, it was mostly due to a lack of skill on the team and not poor play-driving skills, so Rielly’s good numbers that season only gave him a +0.35 5v5 xGA per 60 relative to his team, which was the second worst after Matt Hunwick. And then the 2020-21 and 2021-22 seasons were the height of the Leafs’ elite defensive play in the Kyle Dubas era, so Rielly’s good defensive numbers only gave him a +0.29 and +0.36 5v5 xGA per 60 relative to his team in those respective seasons, which was the worst in both seasons.

On top of that, since Rielly entered the league with the Maple Leafs in the 2013-14 season, their three best defensive seasons in that stretch were 2015-16, 2020-21, and 2021-22 with respective 5v5 xGA per 60’s of 2.28, 2.11, and 2.25 in those seasons, and no other season in that stretch falls below 2.45. So while Rielly was putting up good numbers on a league-wide standard, it was more due to the environment he was in than his own ability.

These numbers make Rielly’s 2023-24 season so far look even more impressive. While 2.6 5v5 xGA per 60 isn’t insanely impressive, it is when you recognize that what is effectively his fourth-best defensive season is coming in the Leafs worst defensive season in that stretch from 2013 to 2023, with the team as a whole allowing 2.79 xGA per 60. The fact that this season’s defense is even worse than the 2013 to 2015 Randy Carlyle/Peter Horachek era of the Leafs just shows how bad they’ve been this year, so Rielly somehow flourishing in this season of all years is surprising.

There are other ways to showcase just how good Rielly has been this season for the Leafs. Goals above replacement (GAR) does a good job of displaying how valuable a player is by showcasing how much better or worse they are then a replaceable NHL player. So far this season, Rielly ranks first among ALL defensemen in GAR with 7.4, and it’s not just because of a dominant offensive GAR, which is still quite solid at 4.9 and is tied for second among defenders. It’s also because of a strong 2.2 defensive GAR, which is tied for 13th among defensemen. Rielly has also never finished a season with a positive defensive GAR, and the closest he’s ever come was in a bottom-pair role in his rookie season in 2013-14 with a -0.4 defensive GAR.

Along with GAR, we also have the regularized adjusted plus-minus (RAPM) model from Evolving Hockey that does an even better job of showcasing how well a player is doing by isolating their play from other factors like teammates, competition, rink bias, and more. So if we use that and look at those previous season where Rielly was really good defensively in 2015-16, 2020-21, and 2021-22, it shows that Rielly’s good numbers were affected by the team, as opposed to a good performance from him.

The xGA/60 and CA/60 in the first box are what we want to pay attention to here, and as you can see, it’s a lot of red. Even in those seasons where he was surrounded by good defensive systems and teammates. And yet, when you look at this season, it’s a much different story.

Somehow, Rielly has managed to put together good defensive results despite never having done so previously. Much like his GAR results in his career, Rielly has almost never had strong RAPM results, with only one season with a negative RAPM xGA/60 in 2016-17 and none with a negative RAPM CA/60 (and like relative xGA/60, negative is good here). He stands out well compared to the rest of the league as well, as his -0.056 RAPM xGA/60 is tied for 43rd among defensemen with 200 minutes played, while his -3.07 RAPM CA/60 ranks seventh among that group.

Oh, and Rielly’s also quietly tied for 12th in scoring for defensemen with three goals, 12 assists, and 15 points in 17 games, and that’s while only playing 12:25 of ice time with the top power play unit compared to John Klingberg’s 43:48. With Klingberg seemingly out of the lineup for the foreseeable future, Rielly’s production should improve on top of his 11 even-strength points that ties him for seventh in the league.

All in all, it’s been a really strong start to the season for Morgan Rielly, especially after he was falling out of favor with the fanbase last season. It’s possible that this is just a solid stretch of play and we’ll see him return to normal as the season carries on, but make no mistake, this defensive start hasn’t been him looking good because of a good defense partner or strong goaltending. He’s been doing this all on his own, and it’s even crazier to think about when you consider how bad the Leafs has been defensively this season. Perhaps the Leafs finally have that elite No. 1 defenseman they’ve been looking for after all.

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