This is the 2022-23 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Charlie Coyle
Boston Bruins Center
Forty-four points in all 82 games at 17:24, and the only one of Boston's six most-used forwards who finished the season a minus.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012-13 | MIN | 37 | 8 | 6 | 14 | +3 | 28 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 50 | 16.0 | 15:04 |
| 2013-14 | MIN | 70 | 12 | 18 | 30 | -7 | 33 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 135 | 8.9 | 17:05 |
| 2014-15 | MIN | 82 | 11 | 24 | 35 | +13 | 39 | 1 | 0 | 4 | 120 | 9.2 | 14:33 |
| 2015-16 | MIN | 82 | 21 | 21 | 42 | +1 | 16 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 140 | 15.0 | 17:18 |
| 2016-17 | MIN | 82 | 18 | 38 | 56 | +13 | 36 | 4 | 0 | 5 | 159 | 11.3 | 16:42 |
| 2017-18 | MIN | 66 | 11 | 26 | 37 | +8 | 18 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 117 | 9.4 | 16:32 |
| 2018-19 | MIN/BOS | 81 | 12 | 22 | 34 | -1 | 20 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 155 | 7.7 | 16:46 |
| 2019-20 | BOS | 70 | 16 | 21 | 37 | +9 | 21 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 145 | 11.0 | 16:47 |
| 2020-21 | BOS | 51 | 6 | 10 | 16 | -4 | 20 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 79 | 7.6 | 16:17 |
| 2021-22 | BOS | 82 | 16 | 28 | 44 | -6 | 32 | 3 | 0 | 5 | 131 | 12.2 | 17:24 |
| 2022-23 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 703 | 131 | 214 | 345 | +29 | 263 | 15 | 5 | 30 | 1231 | 10.6 | 16:31 |
This Season So Far
The 2022-23 season has not started. The empty row above is his, and both it and this paragraph fill in on their own from the morning after he first plays: what he has done, what it is worth against his own last season, and the run he is on when the two disagree.
Last Season
16 goals and 28 assists in all 82 games — 44 points at 17:24 a night, minus-6, with 3 power-play goals and 5 game-winners on 131 shots and 32 penalty minutes.
52.1 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,070 minutes, the 71st percentile. His ice went 43-47 against an expectation of 42.15-38.74 — the scoring landed where the chances said, and eight more went in behind him than they predicted.
Minus-6 is the only negative among Boston’s six most-used forwards, and the eight-goal gap in his own end is the reason. On a club that finished 4th in goals against, somebody has to be the third line and it was him.
The Finesse Game
131 attempts at a median of 23 feet with 53 per cent from inside 20, converting at 12.2 per cent. The chart is a centre’s chart and the volume is not: 5.51 shots per 60 is the 17th percentile among forwards.
1.79 even-strength points per 60 at the 51st percentile and 345 points in 703 career games. He is a genuine third-line centre and has been paid like a second-line one since 2019, which is the tension in every conversation about him.
The Physical Game
6-3 and 221, and the puck stays his on a wall for longer than it has any right to. The measured record is ordinary — 3.53 hits per 60 at the 45th percentile — and the value is in possession retained rather than contact delivered, which is a thing this book cannot count.
1:38 a night shorthanded, the 77th percentile among forwards.
Top speed 21.8 mph at the 16th percentile and 2.9 bursts above 20 mph per 60 at the 18th. He is slow, and at 30 that is the number that decides how the next three years go.
The Intangibles
Twenty-eighth overall in 2010 by San Jose, traded to Minnesota before he played a game there, and 703 games since with a long playoff record in Boston attached.
He is 30, signed through 2026. Boston’s centre depth is a 37-year-old, a 25-year-old just acquired from New Jersey, and Coyle, and if Patrice Bergeron does not play beyond this season the whole question of whether Charlie Coyle can be a second-line centre stops being hypothetical.
What kind of player
The searchable half of the report. The first group is computed from the season's own data; the rest are read out of the prose above, and each one carries the sentence that produced it. A subject the report never raised is simply absent.
- measuredcomputed here from the season's own data
- a strengthread out of the prose, and claimed
Each computed tag also says how well its measure holds up from one season to the next, because a tag describes a season that has finished and a reader will assume it predicts the one coming. Some do and some do not, and the gap is wide: five-on-five workload repeats well, scoring late does not repeat at all.
- clutch· scored his goals when the game was still live
3 of his 16 goals late or in overtime, 91st percentile among forwards
Season to season, this measure barely repeats (0.06) · 10% keep it
- durable· was available
82 of 82 games
Season to season, this measure repeats weakly (0.32) · 53% keep it
“1:38 a night shorthanded, the 77th percentile among forwards”
“6-3 and 221, and the puck stays his on a wall for longer than it has any right to”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2021-22 · 1,070 minutes
- Expected goals
- 52.1%
- 71st pct
- Shot attempts
- 50.6%
- 61st pct
share of the chances while he was out there
share of the attempts while he was out there
Goals while he was on the ice: 43 for, 47 against. Expected: 42.1 and 38.7.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 18 points of one another. It was written for a back edition, with the seasons that followed already known. Neither the agreement nor the gap says anything about the eye, and this report is excluded from the club-level comparison for the same reason.
Both bars are percentiles among the 649 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 61 on their own scale — against every other report's mean. The numbers bar ranks his share of expected goals. A gap is a disagreement about where he belongs, not two scales talking past each other.
Tracked
NHL Edge, 2021-22 · 82 games
- Top speed
- 21.8 mph
- 34th pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 0.84 a game
- Distance
- 2.82 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 94.8 mph
- 89th pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 22.0
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 84.1
A top speed is a season's best, and a man who takes more shifts gets more tries at one; the percentile is the feed's own, against every skater, and says less between a top-pair defenceman and a fourth-line wing than it does between two men in the same job. The counts are shown per game for the same reason.
Usual linemates
2021-22 · 1070 minutes at five-on-five
- Craig Smith54%
- Taylor Hall27%
Share of his five-on-five ice time spent alongside each player, measured from shift charts. Special teams are excluded: a power-play unit is not a line.
Why the numbers land there
Five-on-five, 2021-22
- The club
- BOS took 56.2% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 52.1% — 4.1 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- Third line, 1,070 minutes at five-on-five — 71st percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Craig Smith | 53.0% | 51.1% | 60.7% |
| Trent Frederic | 52.0% | 52.2% | 54.4% |
| Brandon Carlo | 52.8% | 51.7% | 52.1% |
53.0% together, 51.1% for him apart and 60.7% for Smith apart. Smith was better away from him while his own share held, which is a mark against him more than for him.
Expected-goal share while both were on the ice, and for each man in the minutes he played without the other. Apart is the pair subtracted from his own totals. It does not settle who was carrying whom — apart from each other, both were still playing with somebody — but it does say whether the share travelled when the pairing broke up.
Where he shoots from
goal on goal missed
185 unblocked shots in 2021-22, 18 of them goals. His median goal came from 15 feet. 44% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 22% from beyond forty.