This is the 2025-26 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Jake Middleton
Minnesota Wild Defense
21 points, 6-3 and 219 pounds, and a 47.1 per cent chance share beside the club's most-used defenceman.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018-19 | SJS | 3 | 0 | 1 | 1 | -1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | — | 9:56 |
| 2019-20 | SJS | 10 | 0 | 2 | 2 | -2 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 9 | 0.0 | 10:46 |
| 2020-21 | SJS | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0.0 | 8:44 |
| 2021-22 | SJS/MIN | 66 | 4 | 10 | 14 | +10 | 82 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 73 | 5.5 | 18:41 |
| 2022-23 | MIN | 79 | 3 | 12 | 15 | +15 | 72 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 79 | 3.8 | 19:02 |
| 2023-24 | MIN | 80 | 7 | 18 | 25 | -15 | 77 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 85 | 8.2 | 19:49 |
| 2024-25 | MIN | 67 | 8 | 13 | 21 | +11 | 40 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 97 | 8.3 | 21:52 |
| 2025-26 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 306 | 22 | 56 | 78 | +16 | 284 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 344 | 6.4 | 19:23 |
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
8 goals and 13 assists in 67 games for 21 points, plus-11, on 21:52 a night.
47.0 per cent at five-on-five, the 26th percentile, over 1,293 minutes, largely beside Brock Faber. His on-ice goals were 47-45 against an expected 45.8-51.5, which is seven goals of goaltending in the pairing’s favour.
The Finesse Game
Modest. 97 shots and 8 goals is a decent return for a defensive defenceman and 13 assists at 22 minutes a night is a low one.
The first pass is safe rather than quick. He does not create anything and does not attempt to.
The Physical Game
6-3 and 219, and this is the case. He clears his crease, hits, and is one of two men on this blue line who defend the paint by force.
40 penalty minutes over 67 games is a moderate rate for the style.
The Intangibles
A third-round pick, two organisations, and a career that took until 26 to become an NHL regular.
At 30 the projection is a second-pair defenceman who plays 20 minutes. The 24th-percentile share is the pairing’s number as much as his, and the pairing is the club’s top one.
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
- he lacks itraised, and he does not have it
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.
- slot-man· shoots from where goals are scored
16.3% of his attempts in the slot, 90th percentile among defencemen
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.69) · 44% keep it
- workhorse· carries the load at even strength
19:18 a game at five-on-five, 97th percentile among defencemen
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.78) · 58% keep it
“He clears his crease, hits, and is one of two men on this blue line who defend the paint by force.”
“6-3 and 219, and this is the case. He clears his crease, hits, and is one of two men on this blue line who defend the paint by force.”
“The first pass is safe rather than quick. He does not create anything and does not attempt to.”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2024-25 · 1,293 minutes
- Expected goals
- 47%
- 26th pct
- Shot attempts
- 45.5%
- 15th 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: 47 for, 45 against. Expected: 45.8 and 51.5.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe two rank him within 16 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 637 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 71 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, 2024-25 · 67 games
- Top speed
- 22.6 mph
- 86th pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 0.42 a game
- Distance
- 2.94 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 94.4 mph
- 75th pct
fastest he was clocked all season; the league's average best is 21.6
how often he reaches that speed, not how fast he goes
skated, all strengths
one shot; the league's average best is 89.7
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
2024-25 · 1293 minutes at five-on-five
- Brock Faber74%
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
- MIN took 49.1% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 47.0% — 2.1 below the club he did it on.
- The role
- First pair, 1,293 minutes at five-on-five — 91st percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brock Faber | 46.7% | 47.8% | 45.4% |
| Matt Boldy | 51.2% | 44.3% | 55.2% |
| Marco Rossi | 52.3% | 44.2% | 53.2% |
46.7% together, 47.8% for him apart and 45.4% for Faber apart. Splitting them up moved neither man. Whatever is driving the share, it is not this pairing.
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
135 unblocked shots in 2024-25, 8 of them goals. His median goal came from 33 feet. 13% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 61% from beyond forty.