Toronto hasn't had many picks over the past few years, after trading away many on most years for their playoff runs. Last season, they picked more than usual – but the majority were late round picks they had built up or even acquired at the draft.

The very last pick in last year's draft was Nathan Mayes, drafted out of Spokane in the WHL. He was a 6'4" left handed defenseman who didn't have a lot of points, sterling tracking data or overly positive scouting reports. He had the dubious honour of earning the title of "Mr. Irrelevant", which is given to the last pick in each year's draft.

Good news for Toronto fans, Mayes might be one of the more relevant prospects they drafted last summer.

STATS & CONTEXT

When Mayes was drafted, I did my usual deep dive into each pick to see what I thought of them. I watched several of their games and read as many scouting reports as I could find. What I saw and read about Mayes is a big defenseman who was definitely a defensive specialist who skated well and played with a physical edge. That didn't mean he was a goon – I actually thought his defensive play was better than Matt Lahey, another bigger defensive defenseman who had much stronger sounding scouting reports about his defense and skating.

Getting to Know Nathan Mayes
Looking at the highlights, scouting reports, and game video of Toronto’s latest hulking defensemen drafted out of Spokane in the 7th round of the 2024 NHL draft.

As of writing this, Mayes is sitting at 3 goals and 17 points in 30 games this season. One thing to note is that he has 7 points in his last 7 games. In fact, since he missed a month's worth of games in November due to injury, he has 11 points in 13 games. He's already surpassed his best in goals (3 vs 1) and points (17 vs 16) from last year, in fewer than half the games played (30 vs 68).

Mayes' 17 points is the second most among all defensemen on his team, despite never playing on the powerplay – all but one of his points was at even strength, the one exception was short handed goal. So he has surprisingly good production at 5v5 considering his reputation going into this year.

Digging into his 5v5 production, I pulled all the stats and figured out the 5v5 production for all defensemen in the WHL with a minimum of 10 games played. On a per game basis, Mayes is in the top 20 for all defensemen in even strength point rate (0.53). He's in the same range as top picks and guys with more of a reputation for driving offense like Tanner Moldenyk (0.54), Tarin Smith (0.55), Jackson Smith (0.54), and is even slightly ahead of Carter Yakemchuk (0.52), Lukas Dragicevic (0.49), and Noah Chadwick (0.47).

Now, does this mean Mayes is better or as good offensively as these guys? No, especially since a lot of his points comes from secondary assists where he doesn't really help generate the offensive chance. So I would not say that, but I'll get into it more later.

Comparing Nathan Mayes' tracking data from last year (left) to this year (right); data from Mitch Brown's CHL tracking project: https://www.patreon.com/posts/2024-25-tracking-118499987

When looking at Mayes' tracking data, you can see someone who has strong impacts on defense and especially on transitions, and surprisingly good offensive impacts. More specifically, his biggest impacts are coming from driving successful zone exits thanks, in part, due to being good on retrievals during dump ins. When you compare his tracking data this year to last, he's made big improvements across the board.

As far as usage goes, Mayes has mostly been a second pairing guy. He's had some games where he played on the top pairing, so he's been sort of a borderline top pairing guy for Spokane. While he doesn't get any powerplay time to speak of, at least that I've seen, he is on their go-to unit to kill penalties. It's hard to quantify his specific impact on the penalty kill, but I will note that Spokane has the WHL's best PK%.

Combine all of this with the fact that he does not take many penalties (18 mins in 30 games) despite being a physical, defensive defenseman and Mayes has become a guy who provides good value for Spokane despite limited offensive usage.

SCOUTING REPORT

It's taken me some more time to appreciate Mayes' game, and there are two main reasons for this. First, is that his skills are not flashy nor does he stand out in any given area or skill. He plays with a kind of quiet competency that isn't at an elite level, but he just goes about his business. Second is that the things he's good at, even if not at an elite level, are the kinds of things that are just harder to notice – for me, anyway.

I'll start with his defense, since that was said to be his bread and butter. I've seen some scouts refer to Mayes' defense as 'reactive' as opposed to being proactive in influencing the opposing puck carrier to do what he wants. That's the kind of high level defense where you angle them with body and stick positioning to areas of the ice where you can more easily neutralize them. I do think that's sort of true about Mayes, but I wouldn't say that makes him passive. His strengths on defense comes from a combination of being big, having a long reach, being a good skater and being physical.

It's the physical and size element that stands out the most to me, and why I think Mayes' defense is as effective as it is. That doesn't mean he's a bruising, punishing goon who chases crushing hits. But he uses his size and physicality to impose his will on a puck carrier. Even if they have their backs to Mayes, he will use his strength to push them off balance, then use his reach to knock the puck away from them.

I see three layers to Mayes' defense. The first is when he's in front of the puck carrier – he has a good stick which he uses to poke and sweep at the puck to knock it away. If the player tries to skate around him, he'll close the gap and try and check them into the boards or knock them off balance so they slow down, at which point he'll smother them or take the puck away. If that doesn't work, and they get a step on him, he still has that good reach and deft use of his stick to knock it loose. What helps him a lot here is his skating. He may not be the fastest or most elite skater, but he is fast enough with his size and – most importantly – very quick and smooth with his pivots when forced to switch from skating backwards to skating forwards, so he doesn't lose speed. It is hard for most players to just blow by him.

Here are some examples of all that:

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Nathan Mayes (#5 in red/white) - Defense Highlights

The next part about Mayes' defense that is just as (if not more) important is his ability to get the puck safely out of the zone once he creates that turnover. The early tracking data shows him to be very effective at driving zone exits, and I could see that in the games I've watched.

Mayes isn't a guy who can dangle his way out of trouble, or take it end to end on a solo rush. But he is smart and uses his strengths to his advantage. That means using his size and physicality to establish body positioning, to get leverage and separation once he has the puck. Then it's easier and less pressured for him to make that all important first pass out of the zone. If he faces a second level of pressure from other forecheckers, he's elusive enough to not constantly be turning it over. And while he is not a great passer, he's also good enough to make that pass around or past that secondary pressure.

Here are some examples of what I'm talking about:

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Nathan Mayes (#5 in red/white) - Zone Exits Highlights

Lastly I'll talk about his offense. I'm not going to say he's some hidden gem with some secret and elite offensive skill. He's not even at Chadwick's level. However, I think the same kind of elusiveness when puck handling, and being able to make simple but effective passes with a touch of creativity that helps him achieve good zone exits also helps him assist in the offensive flow of his teammates.

He does have his moments of making a bungle when trying to handle the puck along the blueline, but they're not a constant problem. At worst, he can be relied on to keep the puck moving in the offensive zone. It will not often help break the defense down and set up a scoring chance, but he isn't a liability either. You can see hints of that while watching him, and his tracking data as well. He's good at making passes, shots, or shot-passes into the slot or around the net for his teammates to make deflections, create rebounds, or set up sharp angle shots.

Here are some examples:

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Nathan Mayes (#5 in red/white) - Offense Highlights

CONCERNS & DEVELOPMENT GOALS

Mayes has found a way to become a very good defenseman in the WHL, and he has the physical size and skating to give him a higher floor when it comes to projectability compared to smaller guys. He should be commended for improving as much as he has, but he is still not without his problems.

As I mentioned above, his skill level in pretty much every area of the game is not that high. He's also not the 'smartest' player. As a player archetype, Mayes is similar to Danford – their biggest strengths lie in their defensive impacts, plus having good physical tools and enough offensive skill/potential to make them valuable at higher levels.

However, this is where that whole reactive vs dictating thing comes in. Mayes does seem more passive, or perhaps it's better to say not as impactful on defense at as high level or as consistently as someone like Danford. So it's harder to project Mayes' defense to higher levels, even if he has the advantage of size.

So the biggest area I'd like Mayes to improve on is his defensive reads, and being more consistently impactful on defense. I'm hoping he can spend more time talking with Toronto's development staff, like Jake Muzzin, on all the high level tricks and maneuvers NHL defensemen use to dictate play more even without the puck. Get better at preventing the need for defending in his own end by shutting things down in the neutral zone on a consistent basis. The more defensively versatile he can get, the better his potential will become.

The other area for improvement is just offensive consistency. If Mayes can cut down on the bungles and turnovers while being able to execute his zone exits and transition passing on a more consistent basis, that just adds to his reliability. Some smaller improvements would be to continue improving his skating, both in terms of his speed, explosiveness and footwork. All of this may only be enough to turn Mayes into someone like Simon Benoit, or a lesser version of a Justin Holl as his best case outcome.

Getting either would be a big success for a guy who was the very last pick taken in the NHL draft. It's a testament to Mayes' improvement that it's not something that seems impossible anymore. However, he has a ways to go with more improvements needed to make reaching those heights seem legitimately realistic.

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