SIMMONS: Mitch Marner stars as The Invisible Man in Leafs series ...

The list of right wingers who have outscored Mitch Marner in his career is a short one.

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It starts with two-time scoring champion, Nikita Kucherov, moves to the brilliant David Pastrnak and then stops at Marner’s name, third at his position.

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The company he keeps statistically, is elite.

The salary he is paid by the Maple Leafs is Toronto overpay elite.

The consistency he has played with once establishing himself at age 21, season to season, year to year, has been unlike any Maple Leafs winger in history.

Three times he has scored at more than a 100-point pace per an 82-game schedule. Three times he has scored between 93 and 99 points. Twice he has been a first team NHL all-star, which no Leafs forward has been since Frank Mahovlich.

Marner’s past four seasons, on a points-per-game basis, have been almost a straight line — 1.23, 1.23, 1.34 and 1.21.

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A line of consistency. A line of excellence.

All of which makes his ordinary playoffs, again this year, more than disquieting.

He yearns to be a superstar in more than paycheque. He yearns to be a difference-maker and a hockey celebrity. He yearns to be great when it’s time to be great — and that’s all inside of him.

He doesn’t yearn to disappear the way in which he has disappeared in the first two games of this playoff series against Boston. He doesn’t want to be The Invisible Man. Nobody does.

This is the time of season to be great, to stand out, to be noticed, to find a way, in Rick Tocchet’s words, to fight your way through the pain.

In fairness, this has been a transitional time for Marner and in the series with Boston the transition has not gone so well. This season, big picture, was the largest separation he has had from longtime linemate Auston Matthews and not necessarily from a same-line point of view, but from a developmental point of view.

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The better Matthews has played, the more he has grown, the more Marner seems to be the same. Not growing. Not getting better. Not getting worse, regular-season wise. Not changing his game enough or altering it when he has to.

Matthews is flapping his wings and flying. He was the best Leaf in Game 1, but it was hard to notice because the team was so terrible.

He was the best player on the ice in Game 2 and that was obvious to anyone watching. He was a man amongst boys in Boston on Monday night, which he can be when at his skating best.

Marner still is learning to fly at playoff time — when there is less space, less time and more intensity for a dancer who needs room to dance.

This dance floor is too crowded for him. His game is more subtle than it is for other great players. More instinctive. Less time staying in his lane.

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Since Sheldon Keefe took over as Leafs coach, he instantly stapled Matthews to Marner, the M&Ms, the Maple Leafs’ Goldust Twins, the perfect combination of scorer and setup man.

He basically banked his future on the two youngsters. One with large, wide shoulders, one thin but immensely skilled, a duo made in hockey heaven.

Then Marner got hurt this season. And Matthews surprisingly found his way on an unlikely line with Max Domi and Tyler Bertuzzi. In their first 11 games together, they combined for 37 points. Matthews scored eight goals, Bertuzzi had seven. Domi came alive as a different style of playmaker than Marner.

When Marner returned from injury in early April, Keefe — now coaching for his job — kept the new first line together and moved him to a line with John Tavares.

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It was done to balance the lineup. It was done to see if Marner could make Tavares dance the way he did the first year they played together, when the captain scored 47 goals.

In the first two games against the Leafs, Pastrnak and Bruins captain Brad Marchand had combined for four points. Jake DeBrusk has four points all by himself.

Marner has none.

And with William Nylander missing from the first two games with some mysterious injury, having no points becomes even more startling.

And really, outside of a goal called off on a Bertuzzi high stick, Marner hasn’t really been an offensive factor of any kind.

Around the NHL, in the early playoff season, the ex-Leaf Zach Hyman already has scored a hat trick in Edmonton, Kyle Connor had three points in Winnipeg’s first game, Adrian Kempe scored two in the first game for Los Angeles, Seth Jarvis has three in Carolina and Matthew Tkachuk has two points in one game in Florida.

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In his past eight playoff games, going back to last April and May, Marner has one even-strength point. In his past 11 playoff games, he has scored one goal.

Those aren’t the kind of numbers Marner would want to hear about. He doesn’t like to hear about what he doesn’t do or hasn’t done. It annoys him because he expects so much of himself. And it annoys him because he’s easily annoyed.

His salary pays him as a Top 10 player in the NHL. Top 10 before his contract comes up a year from now. It’s time now for him to embrace the pain and be the player he knows he can be.

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