Jake Middleton Has To Recover From A Slow Start

The Minnesota Wild are used to leaning on Jake Middleton, and Middleton is used to delivering for the team. Since the Wild acquired him from the San Jose Sharks at the 2022 trade deadline, they've entrusted him with increasingly demanding workloads. He went from 19:02 in his first full campaign in Minnesota to 19:49 in the 2023-24 season to a whopping 21:52 last year. 

That's a huge piece of the puzzle as to why Middleton is a long-term part of the Wild's core, eight games into a four-year, $4.35 million AAV deal. He's also a major glue guy in Minnesota's locker room, with his tarps-off mentality, piratesque grin, and goofy energy. We saw the on-ice ability and off-ice demeanor come together with a big, violent, but clean hit that nearly deleted Matt Duchene from our plane of existence.

Rookie Zeev Buium credited the Wild's furious-but-not-quite-enough third-period comeback to the hit. "I got electrified by it," he told Michael Russo at The Athletic. "To see that was pretty electrifying and definitely got the entire group going."

Middleton's response? "Big boy league."

However, that's arguably been the most visible Middleton has been at the start of the season. He's not alone on the team -- one player struggling doesn't create a 3-4-1 start by themselves. But through the first 10% of the season, Middleton's slow start might be having the sneakiest impact on the team.

Of the 193 defensemen who've played 50-plus 5-on-5 minutes this season, Middleton sits 176th with an expected goals for percentage of just 38.1%. That's dead last on a team that is employing rookie Zeev Buium and David Jiříček, who is 21. While Middleton takes on a heavier defensive workload, he's also often playing with partners who are used to handling a tough-minutes role.

Middleton has spent 37.7% of his 123 5-on-5 minutes with Jared Spurgeon, who's historically been his partner when they are healthy. In that time, though, they've only controlled 35.3% of the expected goal share. During his 23 minutes with Faber (19.0% of his 5-on-5 time), their xGF% is an abysmal 14.4. It's a small, small sample size, but that pairing was also under 50% over 944 minutes last year.

Again, there are few innocents on the Wild's blueline. If we want to talk about defensemen who are underwater at 5-on-5, we can point out Faber (47.7 xGF%), Jonas Brodin (45.4%), Buium (44.5%), and Spurgeon (42.0%). But we can point to two fairly unique ways that Middleton's struggles are especially hurting Minnesota.

For one, on a team whose No. 1 issue is a lack of 5-on-5 offense, Middleton has especially been a black hole for Minnesota. The Wild are averaging just 1.57 expected goals per hour at 5-on-5 with Middleton on the ice. Looking back at our 193 defensemen, Middleton is all the way down at 185th, hanging out with the Logan Stanleys and Jamie Oleksiaks of the world. The actual goals (1.01 per hour, 169th among defensemen) are in line with the expected goals issues.

Say what you want about slow starts from anyone else, but Middleton is also putting his team in disadvantageous situations with undisciplined play. Being a physical, defensive defenseman puts a player in a greater position to take penalties, of course. Hits can land awkwardly, and sometimes, taking a penalty is a less-bad option than allowing a one-on-one chance with a goalie. Still, Middleton has generally been good at avoiding penalties.

In 2022-23, Middleton played 79 games and took just 16 minor penalties. Last year, he took just 15 minor penalties in 67 games. In eight games so far this season, he's been tagged for five minor calls (including a double-minor), which is more than the rest of the Wild's blueline combined.

Middleton isn't going to absorb the huge minutes someone like Faber gets. He's not as highly paid as Faber or Spurgeon or Brodin. He's not being counted on as a core member of the future in a way that Buium or Jiříček are. That's all true, and one could argue that his struggles should go under the radar, given all that.

At the same time, the Wild's blueline is competitive. Right now, Jiříček is only in the lineup because of an injury to Zach Bogosian, or he'd be in the AHL. Daemon Hunt has yet to draw in for a game. On the left side, Carson Lambos is fifth on the depth chart, despite a solid preseason where he made a case for being NHL-ready.

But the Wild aren't going to stop leaning on Middleton, and eight poor games aren't going to change that. Nor should they. Middleton has been a reliable defenseman for them, and the best version of him is a solid NHLer who can be a top-four defenseman in a pinch. But for the Wild to make it back to the playoffs and hope to go beyond the first round, Middleton returning to form is a small but impactful piece of that equation.