f*** man...
If it tskes another 3 years for retool to be done your talkong about 29ish Matthews and 30isb Nylander
Will be super tough to win then as they get older and begin to decline and have injuries become more frequent
There is absolutely no way Leafs are gonna be able to comepete next season IMO given the way the "high AAV" players perform in the playoffs. They apparently need help; they can't get their line mates going; they need someone to get them going while making ridiculous AAV
and since all core4 cap hits (including matthews and nylander raises) are gonna count against the cap next season its almost next to impossible to compete next year. Four forwards with 11AAV+ next season... how does one even expect to have balanced line up? And the core4 offense doesn't show up in the post season at least based on the evidence we have especially in elimination games
The only way out of it is the core4 make their line-mates better driving their own lines; which given past evidence doesn't seem likely....
Leafs have to at least wait out the Tavares contract.