This is the 2022-23 edition — an archived read. Read the 2026-27 report →
Tage Thompson
Buffalo Sabres Center
Thirty-eight goals off the hardest shot in the league — 101.6 mph, the 100th percentile — with only 34 per cent of his attempts from the slot.
| Season | Team | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | PP | SH | GW | S | S% | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017-18 | STL | 41 | 3 | 6 | 9 | -12 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 55 | 5.5 | 11:55 |
| 2018-19 | BUF | 65 | 7 | 5 | 12 | -22 | 20 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 108 | 6.5 | 12:08 |
| 2019-20 | BUF | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | — | 6:59 |
| 2020-21 | BUF | 38 | 8 | 6 | 14 | -6 | 17 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 96 | 8.3 | 13:52 |
| 2021-22 | BUF | 78 | 38 | 30 | 68 | -17 | 37 | 10 | 2 | 4 | 253 | 15.0 | 17:53 |
| 2022-23 so far | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Career | — | 223 | 56 | 47 | 103 | -57 | 86 | 13 | 2 | 4 | 512 | 10.9 | 14:23 |
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
38 goals and 30 assists in 78 games — 68 points at 17:53 a night, minus-17, with 10 power-play goals and 2 shorthanded on 253 shots, converting at 15.0 per cent, and 37 penalty minutes.
He had 38 goals in his first 145 NHL games and 38 in this one.
The shot leaves his stick at 101.6 mph — the 100th percentile, the hardest recorded release of any forward in the league. And the median attempt comes from 33 feet, the 96th percentile for distance, with only 34 per cent of them from inside the slot — the 3rd percentile.
That combination is the entire player. He is 6-6, he stands at the top of the circle, and he scores from where nobody else can because the puck arrives before a goaltender has finished moving.
48.5 per cent of the expected goals at five-on-five over 1,085 minutes, the 43rd percentile. His ice went 67-69 against an expectation of 47.52-50.49 — nineteen goals of scoring above what the chances predicted and nineteen more conceded than they did. Both halves of that are enormous and the first one is mostly him.
The Finesse Game
10.88 shots per 60 is the 94th percentile among forwards and 2.67 even-strength points per 60 is the 87th. He shoots constantly, he converts at 15 per cent, and 30 assists says the passing arrived at the same time as the goals.
10 power-play goals off 2:38 a night of it. A one-timer that hard from a man that tall is a power-play weapon that did not exist in Buffalo a year ago.
2.11 takeaways per 60 is the 81st percentile among forwards, which for a shooter is unusual and is the part of last season nobody predicted.
The Physical Game
6-6 and 220, and the reach means a puck he touches on a wall is difficult to take back. The measured contact is ordinary: 2.84 hits per 60 at the 34th percentile and 1.08 blocks at the 19th.
Top speed 22.6 mph at the 61st percentile with 4.9 bursts above 20 mph per 60 at the 47th. He is not fast for a forward and he is extraordinarily fast for a man of 6-6, and that is the distinction the tracking cannot make and the eye can.
The Intangibles
Twenty-sixth overall in 2016 by St Louis, traded to Buffalo at twenty in the Ryan O’Reilly deal, and 223 games before this season produced 103 points.
He is 24. Everything about the shot chart says the 38 goals were earned and everything about the previous three seasons says nobody saw them coming. Buffalo signed him for seven years in the summer, which is the club betting that a 6-6 centre with the hardest shot in hockey does not go back to being a fourth-liner. On this evidence that is a defensible bet and it is still a bet.
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.
- perimeter· shoots from the outside, by choice or because he cannot get in
33.4% of his attempts from 40 feet or beyond, 96th percentile among forwards
Season to season, this measure repeats well (0.66) · 50% keep it
- durable· was available
78 of 82 games
Season to season, this measure repeats weakly (0.32) · 53% keep it
“2.11 takeaways per 60 is the 81st percentile among forwards”
“6-6 and 220, and the reach means a puck he touches on a wall is difficult to take back”
The numbers underneath
On the ice
Five-on-five, 2021-22 · 1,085 minutes
- Expected goals
- 48.5%
- 43rd pct
- Shot attempts
- 50.8%
- 63rd 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: 67 for, 69 against. Expected: 47.5 and 50.5.
The eye and the numbers
HindsightThe report ranks him 38 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 649 skaters in this edition with a report and enough ice time. The report bar ranks the mean of the grades above — 68 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 · 78 games
- Top speed
- 22.6 mph
- 74th pct
- Bursts over 20 mph
- 1.45 a game
- Distance
- 2.85 miles a game
- Hardest shot
- 101.6 mph
- 100th 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 · 1085 minutes at five-on-five
- Jeff Skinner75%
- Alex Tuch47%
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
- BUF took 46.3% of the expected goals as a club. His own share is 48.5% — 2.2 above the club he did it on.
- The role
- First line, 1,085 minutes at five-on-five — 74th percentile in ice time.
With and without
| Teammate | Together | Him apart | Mate apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jeff Skinner | 49.4% | 45.4% | 49.6% |
| Alex Tuch | 52.7% | 44.9% | 49.8% |
| Rasmus Dahlin | 46.9% | 49.7% | 46.1% |
49.4% together, 45.4% for him apart and 49.6% for Skinner apart. He was worse away from Skinner, who was no better away from him — he needed that pairing more than Skinner did.
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
353 unblocked shots in 2021-22, 42 of them goals. His median goal came from 26 feet. 24% of his shots came from inside twenty feet, 33% from beyond forty.