Speculation: Jets vs Leafs: why were there 2 different results?

[Mortimer Snerd]

Well we have been better since we got healthy and had time to practice. Aren't we 11-6-3 in our last 20?

Not to mention that our players who came back from injury were clearly still playing hurt like MP. We have more than enough numbers to tell us the difference of impact between the guys we were using when we were hurt.

Perhaps we are "playing" the right way now because the things PoMo has been stressing and teaching all season have started to come to fruition.

Oh, it appears Laine is playing the left side of PP1 now so.... I have more faith in PoMo running the PP than the posters here who had some terrible analysis of our players..... Like, Wheeler isn't good on the PP and Buff hates Laine, Lowry has no business there.... so on and so forth

We haven't been healthy in our last 20. Not even close. The only gap in our schedule was the bye week - no practice. We are playing better but those aren't the reasons. So what are?

The bold - why now? What took so long?

Maybe it is all just starting to come together. I would feel a lot better about that if we hadn't seen exactly the same before. What was our record the last 20 games last year? Maurice had better be on a very short leash next year. And Chevy had better get him what he needs in the meantime or he needs to be on a short leash too.

 

[JetsFan815]

If Babcock is such a great coach why did Toronto finish dead last by a mile last year? You'd think a guy that gets constantly gets called the best in the league would have been able to do a lot more even with the group he had.....

Roster has way more to do with success than coaching in this day and age. Being the most injured team in the league and nearly league worst goaltending constantly get brushed under the rug with the hate on for PoMo

Injuries
Schedule
Goaltending
Special teams
Division
Travel

In that order.

He did way more with the sad Leafs roster last season. That Leafs team last year was a top half Corsi team in the NHL. He got all the Leafs scrubs and trade deadline bait to play a system that resulted in them carrying play more often than not. They didn't have the finishing talent, now this season when the got the finishing talent to go along with Babcock's elite system they are going into the playoffs.

And @ you mentioning Schedule, Special teams, Division and Travel. Straight up unabashed excuses that literally any team can use this season.

I despise the Leafs but as the year goes on I am so happy they are doing well, it takes out one excuse that everyone would have been parroting right now- Youth. If it wasn't for the Leafs, Youth would have been repeated as the reason for the Jets struggles like it was last season. Thank you Leafs for taking that out from the repertoire of some Jets fans and media.

Goaltending is the only real excuse here. Not injuries, not schedule, not travel, not a lack of practice days.

Personally I'd have more sympathy with the everything_is_fine.gif crowd if at the very least the Jets had good corsi stats, good special teams numbers and had some improvement in the amount of time they had been shorthanded, one could have been hopeful if that were the case but none of that is true. The only real tangible thing that the Jets have improved over last season seems to be the PP which has gone from dead last to bottom 1/3rd which is an improvement I guess and the shooting % which we all know is a fickle thing. If the Jets sh% regresses next season, the Jets could be even worse off unless there are tangible improvements.

Many Jets fans/media who believe everything_is_fine.gif seem to believe that the Jets are the Carolina Hurricanes, an elite team by almost every measure but missing the playoffs due to an unfortunate set of circumstances. The Jets have serious problems, we are closer to the likes of the Buffalo Sabres and even the Canucks than we are to a team like the Hurricanes, who would have made the playoffs had it not been for some bad luck. Blaming the Jets season on stuff like the schedule and injuries is just being in denial and not productive in a discussion to improve the Jets

We haven't been healthy in our last 20. Not even close. The only gap in our schedule was the bye week - no practice. We are playing better but those aren't the reasons. So what are?

The bold - why now? What took so long?

Not to mention they were pretty much fully healthy in December and Feb (with the exception of Myers) and didn't have any better results.

 

[Weezeric]

The difference is 100% injuries. Look at that graph. The leafs have something like 20 man games lost of their top 9 forwards and top 4 D. The jets had more 6-7 games into the season! Switch the injury luck and their is no doubt the records would be reversed. I sure wish Chevy would've signed matt martin and roman polak last off season. I'm sure everyone would be singing his praises. No wonder Pomo is annoyed at these comparisons. The leafs have faced zero adversity this year.

 

[JetsFan815]

The difference is 100% injuries. Look at that graph. The leafs have something like 20 man games lost of their top 9 forwards and top 4 D. The jets had more 6-7 games into the season! Switch the injury luck and their is no doubt the records would be reversed. I sure wish Chevy would've signed matt martin and roman polak last off season. I'm sure everyone would be singing his praises. No wonder Pomo is annoyed at these comparisons. The leafs have faced zero adversity this year.

Now compare the injury situation to the Ottawa Senators. 1 top-6 player out for the entire season. Additionally, each one of their top-6 players has been out for significant chunks of time this season. Their #1 goalie out for a huge chunk, their d corps has been decimated with injuries lately and they don't have the talent level that the Jets have, yet it seems they will make the playoffs

 

[Whileee]

We haven't been healthy in our last 20. Not even close. The only gap in our schedule was the bye week - no practice. We are playing better but those aren't the reasons. So what are?

The bold - why now? What took so long?

Maybe it is all just starting to come together. I would feel a lot better about that if we hadn't seen exactly the same before. What was our record the last 20 games last year? Maurice had better be on a very short leash next year. And Chevy had better get him what he needs in the meantime or he needs to be on a short leash too.

One criticism that I've levelled at Maurice and the Jets management is the dumb decision for Maurice to be an assistant coach with Team Europe. With 7-9 first and second year players, a new assistant coach, and a schedule that precluded any real practice time in the first part of the regular season, this was a terrible time for Maurice to miss training camp. I think they never really had time to get young players into a system, and this was compounded by a ton of injuries and no practice time. Bad idea, and deserves criticism.

 

[GrizzLeaf]

Leafs fan coming in peace.

You guys have had a rough season but I predict the Jets will be heading upward in the next season or two. Just need a few more players to catch fire and more importantly a number one goalie.

The list I've seen here that says injuries, goaltending and coaching is correct.

Get a number 1 goalie and a lot of losses become wins. Leafs are barely winning some of these games because they go to sleep for long stretches. Anderson has to carry the load when that happens.

I can't really comment on injuries to Jets players but the Leafs really didn't get bit by the injury bug this season (only a few players for very little time).

Coaching is almost as huge as goal tending. I remember Maurice coaching the Leafs and I didn't much like it. He didn't seem to hold the players accountable (but who knows what's said behind closed doors).

Babcock has no issues mentioning how terrible the players have been in post game comments. He also talks about ice time accountability. Not sure if it's talk or not since most players have been bringing it most night. Again, maybe what he does and says behind closed doors is having an effect.

PK and PP went from terrible last season to near the top this season. That's gotta be a combo of coaching and different players.

What no one's mentioned in this thread is just how lucky the Leafs are that so many young players are doing well. I never expect all 3 top rookies for the Leafs to be so good at this stage. Add in Brown and a few others and it's surreal.

As a Leafs fan, I can say the Jets scare me. They will get better. Probably really damn good. Just missing a goalie and a coaching change. You have some great young players and I imagine a couple of prospects just waiting to show what they're made of.

Good luck in the remaining games, and keep your chins up. This team will be scary good in very little time.

 

[KingBogo]

Leafs fan coming in peace.

You guys have had a rough season but I predict the Jets will be heading upward in the next season or two. Just need a few more players to catch fire and more importantly a number one goalie.

The list I've seen here that says injuries, goaltending and coaching is correct.

Get a number 1 goalie and a lot of losses become wins. Leafs are barely winning some of these games because they go to sleep for long stretches. Anderson has to carry the load when that happens.

I can't really comment on injuries to Jets players but the Leafs really didn't get bit by the injury bug this season (only a few players for very little time).

Coaching is almost as huge as goal tending. I remember Maurice coaching the Leafs and I didn't much like it. He didn't seem to hold the players accountable (but who knows what's said behind closed doors).

Babcock has no issues mentioning how terrible the players have been in post game comments. He also talks about ice time accountability. Not sure if it's talk or not since most players have been bringing it most night. Again, maybe what he does and says behind closed doors is having an effect.

PK and PP went from terrible last season to near the top this season. That's gotta be a combo of coaching and different players.

What no one's mentioned in this thread is just how lucky the Leafs are that so many young players are doing well. I never expect all 3 top rookies for the Leafs to be so good at this stage. Add in Brown and a few others and it's surreal.

As a Leafs fan, I can say the Jets scare me. They will get better. Probably really damn good. Just missing a goalie and a coaching change. You have some great young players and I imagine a couple of prospects just waiting to show what they're made of.

Good luck in the remaining games, and keep your chins up. This team will be scary good in very little time.

Thanks for coming by and good post. IMO the biggest reason for the Jets misfortunes this season has been poor goaltending. Very rarely does a goalie ever win us a game. Then I'd say injuries and sub par coaching. But at least IMO we are a lot better team then many around here believe we are. Again IMO we are a lot closer to contending then we are to the bottom.

 

[Ducky10]

Goaltending
Coaching (special teams, player usage, systems)
Injuries

Getting consistent goaltending is certainly a factor, can't ignore that. Their special teams just buried ours, not even close and that's coaching. I also think Babcock is running a system that suits his team and one he can definitely build with. The Leafs definitely still suffer from the same execution issues as any young team, including the Jets, but they play to their strengths and base their structure on that. I don't see Maurice doing that in some important areas, he seems determined to force the team to play a particular way regardless.

Injuries did play a part, no doubt. My only hesitation in placing more emphasis on it is that I didn't see the Jets play much differently once they were healthy, I think that's Maurice.

I'd rather have Babcock but I'd also much rather have the Jets team.

 

[Whileee]

Now compare the injury situation to the Ottawa Senators. 1 top-6 player out for the entire season. Additionally, each one of their top-6 players has been out for significant chunks of time this season. Their #1 goalie out for a huge chunk, their d corps has been decimated with injuries lately and they don't have the talent level that the Jets have, yet it seems they will make the playoffs

Ottawa hasn't been even close to the Jets in terms of injuries this season. Their D injuries are very recent and minimal in the whole season. It's a false equivalency to suggest that they've had the same injury challenges as the Jets.

 

[JetsFan815]

Ottawa hasn't been even close to the Jets in terms of injuries this season. Their D injuries are very recent and minimal in the whole season. It's a false equivalency to suggest that they've had the same injury challenges as the Jets.

They have had significant injuries. Clarke McArthur has been out all season. Craig Anderson has missed nearly half the season. Bobby Ryan, Matt Hoffman, Mark Stone, Derrick Brassard have all missed good chunks of games, sometimes at the same time. And they don't have near the talent of the Jets to make up for these injuries

 

[Jets]

Not to mention all 3 of the Leafs "elite" rookies were drafted one or more spots higher than ours.

Matthews 1st -> Laine 2nd
Marner 4th -> Connor 17th
Nylander 8th -> Ehlers 9th

Say what you want about how well we've done in selecting guys based on our draft position, but in the long run the higher picks are going to be more heavily weighted towards being NHL ready and highly talented.

 

[JetsUK]

Not to mention all 3 of the Leafs "elite" rookies were drafted one or more spots higher than ours.

Matthews 1st -> Laine 2nd
Marner 4th -> Connor 17th
Nylander 8th -> Ehlers 9th

Say what you want about how well we've done in selecting guys based on our draft position, but in the long run the higher picks are going to be more heavily weighted towards being NHL ready and highly talented.

True, but I'd still take Ehlers over Nylander pretty comfortably.

 

[Saintb]

True, but I'd still take Ehlers over Nylander pretty comfortably.

I agree. and I think Laine and Mathews are a wash in the long run. right now marner is far ahead of conner, but go back one more year and Trouba is way ahead of Reilly. so this matchup is going to be great over the coming years I think.
by the way I really like this idea of comparing the Jets to one specific team at a time like this. might make a long offseason more interesting if we could have a series of comparisons like this. Calgary and Edmonton would be interesting. buffalo too..

 

[Mortimer Snerd]

He did way more with the sad Leafs roster last season. That Leafs team last year was a top half Corsi team in the NHL. He got all the Leafs scrubs and trade deadline bait to play a system that resulted in them carrying play more often than not. They didn't have the finishing talent, now this season when the got the finishing talent to go along with Babcock's elite system they are going into the playoffs.

And @ you mentioning Schedule, Special teams, Division and Travel. Straight up unabashed excuses that literally any team can use this season.

I despise the Leafs but as the year goes on I am so happy they are doing well, it takes out one excuse that everyone would have been parroting right now- Youth. If it wasn't for the Leafs, Youth would have been repeated as the reason for the Jets struggles like it was last season. Thank you Leafs for taking that out from the repertoire of some Jets fans and media.

Goaltending is the only real excuse here. Not injuries, not schedule, not travel, not a lack of practice days.

Personally I'd have more sympathy with the everything_is_fine.gif crowd if at the very least the Jets had good corsi stats, good special teams numbers and had some improvement in the amount of time they had been shorthanded, one could have been hopeful if that were the case but none of that is true. The only real tangible thing that the Jets have improved over last season seems to be the PP which has gone from dead last to bottom 1/3rd which is an improvement I guess and the shooting % which we all know is a fickle thing. If the Jets sh% regresses next season, the Jets could be even worse off unless there are tangible improvements.

Many Jets fans/media who believe everything_is_fine.gif seem to believe that the Jets are the Carolina Hurricanes, an elite team by almost every measure but missing the playoffs due to an unfortunate set of circumstances. The Jets have serious problems, we are closer to the likes of the Buffalo Sabres and even the Canucks than we are to a team like the Hurricanes, who would have made the playoffs had it not been for some bad luck. Blaming the Jets season on stuff like the schedule and injuries is just being in denial and not productive in a discussion to improve the Jets



Not to mention they were pretty much fully healthy in December and Feb (with the exception of Myers) and didn't have any better results.

Mostly agree but - a)schedule - we did have a record setting tough schedule, made even harder by the forced absence of our coach during pre-season with a very inexperienced team. b) Special Teams - what do you mean? ST's are a result of our bad coaching, not an excuse. c) Division - gave us a break this year. Faded a bit. d) Travel is an ongoing fact of life in the Western Conference. It does make it tougher but can't be used as an excuse because it isn't going to change. However, in context with the schedule, youth, etc us being the team with the 2nd or 3rd worst travel load is another factor.

There is quite a lot of chicken or egg discussion in this thread and a lot of excuse making. The trouble with the excuses is that they are real, as are the specific criticisms of our coaching. So is the fact that our management team and coaching staff are all going to be back next year.

Since no one is being held accountable this year I think the standard of accountability has to be that much higher next year. If they don't start well then everybody has to go. Coaches, Chevy, everybody. One at a time or all at once. No more excuses.

 

[Mortimer Snerd]

One criticism that I've levelled at Maurice and the Jets management is the dumb decision for Maurice to be an assistant coach with Team Europe. With 7-9 first and second year players, a new assistant coach, and a schedule that precluded any real practice time in the first part of the regular season, this was a terrible time for Maurice to miss training camp. I think they never really had time to get young players into a system, and this was compounded by a ton of injuries and no practice time. Bad idea, and deserves criticism.

Yup. Annoyed as I am with several of the things that Maurice has done and continues to do and also a few things he has not done I have to concede that we had a 'perfect storm' confluence of crap this year. Maurice should not have been made available for that job.

I think it was all Karma. The hockey gods saw the Stanley trade/pick and decided to punish Chevy and the Jets.

 

[surixon]

Yup. Annoyed as I am with several of the things that Maurice has done and continues to do and also a few things he has not done I have to concede that we had a 'perfect storm' confluence of crap this year. Maurice should not have been made available for that job.

I think it was all Karma. The hockey gods saw the Stanley trade/pick and decided to punish Chevy and the Jets.

See I wouldn't have had an issue with Maurice going to the tournament if he had a solid game plan for TC. I mean do our coaches not talk in the summer, how hard would it have been for an assistant to reach systems in TC. I don't understand why Maurice was needed to implement system specific drills.

 

[puck stoppa]

See I wouldn't have had an issue with Maurice going to the tournament if he had a solid game plan for TC. I mean do our coaches not talk in the summer, how hard would it have been for an assistant to reach systems in TC. I don't understand why Maurice was needed to implement system specific drills.

You would think kompon could handle it. If Pmo stays I'd love to at least see all assistants go. Hire paul Maclean to run special teams.

 

[Saintb]

babcock was at the tournament as well it seems to me.

 

[raideralex99]

The Vancouver Canucks and Winnipeg Jets have the most man-games lost in the NHL ... on the other end of the scale the Washington Capitals and Calgary Flames have been the least injured teams in the league.

 

[Flair Hay]

That 32 games in 60 days was insane I'd forgotten by now. The injuries in some respect were almost a blessing with us having some redundant wingers. Gave us some fresh legs here and there. Only catch is other teams in our divisions had brutal schedule too.

If our coach not being as good as Babcock and our management not being as respected as the big money Leafs is a problem? I'd say get used to it. We have improvements to be made but we will likely never have the money to assemble a team of management All Stars. Good on Shanahan for being smart enough to hire the right guys and (hard part) stay the heck out of the way.

 

[Ducky10]

babcock was at the tournament as well it seems to me.

Funny how that gets overlooked. I think the WC thing is the lamest of all the excuses.

 

[Eyeseeing]

Coaching is first and foremost, Babcock gets it done.
Goaltending that's been obvious.
I do think Toronto's record flatters them compared to ours, the loser points they have compared to ours makes us a bit closer than the Toronto fan base would have you believe.
The other issue Toronto had all season is keeping a lead safe they probably are only going to last the first round.
Next year if we get average goal tending that should go A long way in closing the small gap between us.
No sense in going into what a coaching change might do for us because that isn't happening.
GJG

 

[Puckatron 3000]

Regarding the "youth excuse" comparison between TO and WPG, this website lists the Jets as a full year younger on average:

2nd youngest: Jets, avg age 25.759
7th youngest: Leafs, avg age 26.772

I don't actually know if that's correct though.

 

[ps241]

One criticism that I've levelled at Maurice and the Jets management is the dumb decision for Maurice to be an assistant coach with Team Europe. With 7-9 first and second year players, a new assistant coach, and a schedule that precluded any real practice time in the first part of the regular season, this was a terrible time for Maurice to miss training camp. I think they never really had time to get young players into a system, and this was compounded by a ton of injuries and no practice time. Bad idea, and deserves criticism.

I think it set us back but both Babcock and Todd McClellan were head coaches of teams in the World Cup and they seemed to hit the ground running when they got back with NHL teams that were worse than the Jets the previous season?

 

[Whileee]

I think it set us back but both Babcock and Todd McClellan were head coaches of teams in the World Cup and they seemed to hit the ground running when they got back with NHL teams that were worse than the Jets the previous season?

True, but I think Columbus had a more veteran team and neither of those teams had the horrendous early season schedule the Jets had. Also, the Jets had a coach running training camp who had no experience with Maurice (Kompon). They just seemed out of sorts and never really got sorted out. I just think it was he wrong way to set priorities for a coach that had a big task ahead.