Armchair Hockey Scout Beta

This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →

71

Evgeni Malkin

Pittsburgh Penguins Center

50 points at 38 in his nineteenth season, and 1,202 career penalty minutes.

SeasonTeamGPGAPTS+/-PIMPPSHGWSS%TOI
2006-07PIT78335285+280160624213.619:10
2007-08PIT824759106+1678170527217.321:19
2008-09PIT823578113+1780142429012.122:31
2009-10PIT67284977-6100132726810.420:51
2010-11PIT43152237-4185031828.219:49
2011-12PIT755059109+1870120933914.821:01
2012-13PIT3192433+536403999.119:42
2013-14PIT60234972+106270319112.020:04
2014-15PIT69284270-26090421213.218:58
2015-16PIT57273158+165110616216.719:22
2016-17PIT62333972+1877110619117.318:37
2017-18PIT78425698+1687140723917.618:59
2018-19PIT68215172-258990518711.218:48
2019-20PIT55254974+75870517114.619:31
2020-21PIT3382028-4244007211.117:44
2021-22PIT41202242-102490512915.518:20
2022-23PIT82275683-1282110324011.318:35
2023-24PIT82274067+57060219913.618:35
2024-25PIT68163450-244240312512.817:47
2025-26 so far
Career12135148321346+281202183486381013.519:33

This Season So Far

The 2025-26 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 34 assists in 68 games — 50 points at 17:47 a night, with 4 power-play goals and 42 penalty minutes. Minus-24.

47.4 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five, the 26th percentile. His ice went 42-56 against an expectation of 39.60-43.93 — the goals for beat the chances and the goals against did not, by twelve.

The Finesse Game

125 attempts at a median of 21 feet with 48 per cent from inside 20, converting at 12.8 per cent. At 38 he still takes the puck to the middle of the ice, which is remarkable and is also why he gets hit as often as he does.

The hands and the vision are the last things to go and neither has. 34 assists in 68 games from a second line is real production, and the one-handed reach on a puck at full extension is a thing almost nobody else does.

The Physical Game

6-5 and 213 and he has always played angry. He protects the puck with his size, he goes through people rather than around them, and he answers everything.

42 penalty minutes in 68 games, and 1,202 in 1,213 career games. He retaliates, he has done it for nineteen years, and at 38 he is still taking the second penalty in the sequence.

The Intangibles

Second overall in 2004, and he left Russia for it in circumstances that took lawyers to resolve. 1,213 games, 1,346 points, 514 goals, three Stanley Cups, a Conn Smythe, a Hart and an Art Ross.

He is 39, in the last year of his contract, and has played his entire career with the man who was drafted first overall the year after him.

The numbers underneath

On the ice

Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 955 minutes

Expected goals
47.4%
27th pct

share of the chances while he was out there

Shot attempts
49.7%
49th pct

share of the attempts while he was out there

Goals while he was on the ice: 42 for, 56 against. Expected: 39.6 and 43.9.

The eye and the numbers

Hindsight
Report
93rd
Numbers
27th

The report ranks him 66 points above where the numbers do. 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. Why the numbers land there sets out the club he did it on, the minutes he played and the men he played them with.

Both bars are percentiles among the 637 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 82 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.

Usual linemates

2024-25 · 955 minutes at five-on-five

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, 2024-25

The club
PIT took 49.0% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 47.4% — 1.6 below the club he did it on.
The role
Second line, 955 minutes at five-on-five — 55th percentile in ice time.

With and without

TeammateTogetherHim apartMate apart
Michael Bunting47.0%47.7%55.0%
Erik Karlsson46.6%48.1%48.8%
Matt Grzelcyk44.0%49.2%47.5%

47.0% together, 47.7% for him apart and 55.0% for Bunting apart. Bunting 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

177 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 17 of them goals. His median goal came from 12 feet. 48% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 17% from beyond forty.