Understanding Morgan Rielly and his fit in Toronto seems to be a regular occurrence. It is always born out of what Morgan Rielly isn’t and a frustration that he will never be that. The quest for the right partner for Rielly has been going on since he became a Leaf regular and 12 seasons in it seems that Ron Hainsey has been the best answer to that question.

It’s not surprising that with a new coach, the Leafs are back to square one on the Morgan Rielly discussion. Rielly’s production is down. Chris Tanev wasn’t the fit the Leafs thought he’d be with Rielly, and the Leafs are still struggling to determine what is the right fit.

When looking at Morgan Rielly, it is easy to see a parallel player, Phil Housley. Housley was a defenceman who wasn’t the best at playing defence. He was an offensive defenceman without a heavy point shot, and despite all of that he thrived in the NHL thanks to his speed and vision. Housley had the benefit of playing in the highest offence era of the NHL and that isn’t a luxury that Rielly has and certainly brings about a bit more criticism. He’s not a true top defenceman as you don’t want him playing against the biggest offensive threats, but he also doesn’t deliver on what you need from the point on the powerplay. He’s not a heavy hitter, but he’s a good leader and has a great work ethic. He is appreciated but frustrating at the same time. This hasn’t changed in 12 seasons.

Thankfully this year has brought something different and that is Craig Berube. While Berube hasn’t figured out Rielly he is the first Leaf coach in a decade to recognize that Rielly shouldn’t be out against the opposition’s best scorers. Not forcing the Rielly-Tanev pairing was an early game changer for the organization and has been a huge step in fixing the Maple Leafs’ defensive woes. The problem is that the Leafs still aren’t getting the most out of Rielly.

Playing Rielly against second units has improved his defensive measures. He’s seen his goals against, expected goals against, corsi against, and high danger all significantly improve, although his on-ice goals for has taken a significant hit. Couple this with a hurting powerplay and Rielly’s offence has been suffering despite an increased percentage of offensive zone starts.

Last season, Rielly was on the ice with Auston Matthews 37% of the 5v5 time they were both in the lineup. This season that has dropped to 30%. While Rielly’s time with Tavares has increased from 28% of the time together to 31%. The numbers reflect a decline in time with the top centres and while those numbers may normalize once Auston is healthy, it shows the change in Rielly’s offensive role might be a struggle at 5v5.

Rielly’s powerplay time has also declined for the second straight season and while last season that change yielded better outputs for Rielly, this year Morgan has his lowest powerplay points per 60 in five seasons. There has been a renewed interest in the five forward powerplay as well and Oliver Ekman-Larsson has been getting more time on the powerplay than the Leafs have previously offered other defencemen. While NHL Edge measures both defencemen have a peak shot speed of around 91 mph, Ekman-Larsson has had a greater volume of shots above 80 mph than Morgan Rielly and that willingness to send hard shots to the net may be more in line with what Toronto needs.

Getting more out of Rielly on the powerplay likely means letting him play more of a Marner type quarterbacking role on the Leafs second unit or the Leafs splitting up Marner and Nylander on the top unit so there is a greater need for Rielly’s distribution and puck carrying skills. With too much of the same on the powerplay, Rielly doesn’t get a chance to be at his best and historically he has always been a better offensive catalyst at even strength.

Rielly’s 5v5 partners tell an interesting story. While Rielly has primarily played with Ekman-Larsson, the results haven’t been there in any way. Both Rielly and Ekman-Larsson are seeing their offence suffer while not having great against numbers considering they would be utilized as a second pairing.

On the flip side, Rielly was good with Tanev, it’s just the Leafs like McCabe with Tanev better. It seems Tanev is off the table for Rielly except if McCabe is injured. Rielly and Tanev have been better when working together with McCabe out of the lineup than they were to start the season and maybe Craig Berube will revisit this from time to time to maintain some flexibility with the lineup card.

What is interesting are the generally positive numbers between Rielly and Myers when they have been together and this is likely the catalyst for the recent extension for Myers. The chances are there offensively for the Leafs while few chances against. It looks encouraging but comes with the heavy caveat of sheltering this duo. It reaffirms the right stay-at-home partner for Rielly and a bit of sheltering for him yield the best results, but at the same time he’ll need some offensive talent to work with in the forward group and likely an upgraded version of Myers’ archtype.

Rielly is and always has been a square peg surrounded by round holes. He’s a great player but a tough fit and even when the results are good it feels like something can be done to make them better. Having a player like Rielly in the Leafs lineup isn’t so much a necessity as it is a luxury and one that Craig Berube needs to figure out how to optimize as the results so far have been underwhelming. Protecting Rielly from his defensive shortcomings may be a positive step but not at the expensive of his offensive abilities and the Leafs still need to find that balance.

This isn’t entirely on the coach and sorting out the lineup card, but on Rielly as well. The Leafs have a need for creating secondary offence and Rielly can be a big part of generating that. It might be interesting to see what Rielly can do with increased time on ice with players like Max Domi and Nick Robertson. Improving the puck cycle against weaker competition could be an untapped getting Rielly out with a different group more frequently.

The way Rielly plays the game isn’t going to change. He’s not going to wake up tomorrow and start making the right decision when defending odd man rushes and start hammering the puck 100mph. History has also shown that Ekman-Larsson is not the ideal partner and thankfully the best solution probably won’t be an expensive one for Toronto. While it hasn’t been a great season for Rielly, the McCabe-Tanev top pairing is worth dealing with Rielly’s struggles over and Morgan is talented and determined enough that results in the second half of the season could be exactly what the Leafs are looking for.