Matt Boldy Is Making 'The Leap'

It's astonishing to look two weeks into the past and see people cite Matt Boldy as a reason why the Minnesota Wild made a coaching change. What's wrong with Boldy? took the passenger seat to What's wrong with Kirill Kaprizov? as an existential question facing the slumping Wild. Still, that question was being pondered publicly. But with just one goal and a four-game pointless streak when Minnesota fired Dean Evason, it was a major concern.

Just like John Hynes didn't fix the goaltending by telling Filip Gustavsson, Hey, make more saves, no one thinks the new head coach fixed Boldy with the novel suggestion to score more goals. If that is what happened, though, give Hynes the Jack Adams Award because it sure looks like it worked.

Boldy has six goals and eight points in seven games under Hynes, bringing his season totals to 7G-9A-16P in 19 games entering Tuesday's action. Boldy missed seven games due to injury, limiting his possible games this year to 75. Still, he's on pace for 28 goals and 63 points if he hits 75 games. The former is just three off his total from last year, and the latter would match his career-high in fewer games.

It's easy to get caught up in the highs and lows of a season, and Boldy has run hot and cold over his last 100 games or so. Maybe that continues, but looking at the impact he's making during the team's turnaround, Boldy looks like a player who's taking "The Leap." The potential for Boldy to make a massive breakout into one of the NHL's best players is something we've kept our eye on for a while here at Hockey Wilderness. Is it finally happening?

It sure looks like it through almost 20 games. Boldy is an absolute force at 5-on-5 play this season, and this status isn't only a product of his blistering hot streak. On November 21, we noted that Boldy's lack of goals hid the fact that he was generating offense and doing so with primary assists. He directly created scoring opportunities and goals, which gave him offense to rank in the NHL's top 25 in points per hour at 5-on-5 despite scoring just once at that point.

Take a top-25 scorer and then have them go on a heater, and you'll get what we're seeing now with Boldy, which is an average of 3.15 points per hour at 5-on-5. This ranks seventh* in the NHL. Take your pick of superstars: Sidney Crosby (3.04), Connor McDavid (2.96), Elias Pettersson (2.90), or just about anyone else, and Boldy is at least their peer.

A full season of that kind of production will put Boldy in rarified air among NHLers. Looking at everyone who played 750 or more 5-on-5 minutes in a season where they were 22-and-under, only six players have ever averaged 3.00-plus points per hour: Crosby, McDavid, Auston Matthews, Jordan Eberle, Paul Stastny, and Nathan MacKinnon. We're talking four future Hall-of-Famers out of six.

Not that what Boldy has already done isn't impressive already, though. In the Analytics Era (since the 2007-08 season), 240 forwards have played 1500-plus 5-on-5 minutes through age 22. Boldy is one of them, and he's tied with Jonathan Toews with 2.20 points per hour. That's a share of 23rd place over that period. He's ever-so-slightly looking down at Leon Draisaitl (2.19), Pettersson (2.19), and MacKinnon (2.08). 

It gets even better. As many people noted earlier in the year, including Evason, the Wild are paying Boldy to score goals. Few players have done that as well, and as young as Boldy has at 5-on-5. Here are the top 10 players in 5-on-5 goals per hour through age-22:

1. Auston Matthews, 1.59
2. Alex Ovechkin, 1.43
3. Sidney Crosby, 1.39
4. Steven Stamkos, 1.28
5. MATT BOLDY, 1.18
6. Jason Robertson, 1.16
T-7. Bobby Ryan, Connor McDavid, 1.13
9. Vladimir Tarasenko, 1.12
T-10. Cole Caufield, James Neal, Tyler Seguin, 1.11

Eat your heart out, basically every non-generational goal scorer. 

It would be enough if all Boldy brought to the table was his incredible 5-on-5 offense. But of course, there's a whole other side of the puck for Boldy to dominate, which he will, thank you very much. Ask Hynes, and he'll rave about what he's seen from the 22-year-old. "He's playing more and more like [Joel Eriksson Ek] in my opinion," he told The Athletic after a 3-0 win against the Seattle Kraken. "He's just a big, strong horse."

It's tough to say it better than that, and not just for this year. Boldy's two-way impact is generating buzz now, as it should, but it's been a hallmark of his game from Day 1. Over the past three years,  beginning with the 2021-22 season when Boldy broke into the NHL, you can make the case that Boldy's been Minnesota's best defensive forward.

That's near-sacrilege to say on a team that employs Eriksson Ek, Marcus Foligno, and new challenger Connor Dewar. But it might just be Boldy who deserves the Selke Trophy campaigns from the State of Hockey. 

Evolving-Hockey breaks down its Goals Above Replacement (GAR) model into six components. Their goal prevention components are Even-Strength Defense and Short-handed Defense. Boldy's overall defensive impact in the past three years is 7.6 GAR, the rough equivalent of 2.4 points in the standings' worth of value. That figure is tied with Eriksson Ek, and just 0.1 behind Foligno for the team lead among forwards.

Of course, Foligno and Eriksson Ek play a lot of penalty kill minutes, which makes up a small but meaningful chunk of their defensive value. Boldy hasn't gotten those kinds of opportunities yet, which puts him at the top of the list for Even-Strength Defense. 

The last step of the puzzle is getting more scoring on the power play, where he has a fine-but-not-great four points in 62 minutes of ice time. But at 5-on-5? There are no worlds left to conquer. Boldy has to keep this level of play up, but with Eriksson Ek as a partner and getting time with Kaprizov guest-starring on his wing, it seems the opportunities will keep coming. All he needs to do is string together this domination consistently, and we'll be witnessing a player taking "The Leap."

*Among 337 forwards with 200-plus 5-on-5 minutes.

All data via Evolving-Hockey unless otherwise noted.