The leafs should _____ offseason thread

[Channelcat]

They blew it with Tavares, Marner, Matthews, Nylander. They established the culture of money over excellence. It's all on Dubas, Shanahan and MLSE. Very hard to fix at this point. What a waste.

 

[David Bruce Banner]

I'll be surprised if Tavares, Marner and Keefe are with the Leafs come October.

 

[Jeremy2020]

I remember when they hired babs and when this new area/rebuild began. They had the new Logo drop and the future seemed so bright and fun for the Leafs.

What the hell happened lmao

happened

 

[BrannigansLaw]

I'll be surprised if Tavares, Marner and Keefe are with the Leafs come October.

They really shouldn’t be. I’m sick and tired of all three of them. Especially Marner and Tavares. Those two are stone cold losers.

Matthews is a loser too so far to be quite honest but he’s a perennial Rocket winning center nominated for the selke. You don’t trade that away.

 

[Leafshater67]

The D is what killed them. the Leafs D managed to somehow both screen Samsonov at the same time on the game tying goal while no one covered Brazeau on the other side which forced Samsonov to leave the high post open to position against a centering pass.

The D, both of them, spent that entire play doing LITERALLY everything wrong.

The Leafs defense is the single biggest reason they didn't win in regulation.

Imagine spending the majority of your cap on forwards, skimping on D by necessity and pretending that the D was somehow this unstoppable force. of COURSE they weren't good. They weren't DESIGNED to be good.

You’re talking about one play but if the top guys scored or the power play actually worked, it wouldn’t have came to game 7 OT in the first place. Their D was tight which is why the games were so low scoring. Their offensive players were silent and their power play was among the worst I’ve seen in some time, especially considering the firepower they have

 

[GIN ANTONIC]

At this point you need to try anything different in order to break through this nearly 60 year streak of losing culture and failure (obviously not the entire time has been terrible, but ultimately it has not led to overall success).

I think the issues with the Leafs and Toronto market in general is a multi-faceted one that would be very hard to shake based the situation and interests that are baked into the reality of being 'The Mecca of Hockey'. But in essence I think they need to 'stop acting like the Leafs' in order to achieve 'non-Leafy' results.

Lack of accountability, entitlement + complacency, and focus on $$$ above all else isn't a winning recipe but those are the ingredients that they are cooking with. Hard to change that when in order to do that, it means the people who have been making the decisions and been integral parts of building the team/culture would need to be removed and ultimately wouldn't reap the benefits of said changes. At the end of the day they are more happy to be there and lose while making a boatload of money than any alternative.

 

[SEALBound]

I mean what are you watching exactly lol. He's been crying on the bench after every loss. Guy throws 5x more hits in the playoffs than regular season as well. Why would someone who doesnt care all of a sudden become one of the most physical players in the playoffs?

I'm watching a Leafs team lose in the playoffs yet again with the knowledge that they won two games down 3-1 without Matthews. He comes back, they lose.

 

[nturn06]

They really shouldn’t be. I’m sick and tired of all three of them. Especially Marner and Tavares. Those two are stone cold losers.

Matthews is a loser too so far to be quite honest but he’s a perennial Rocket winning center nominated for the selke. You don’t trade that away.

I think that part of the Leafs problems is the fact that they ended the regular season and probably entered the playoffs with the mindset "we need to get AM as many goals as we can", instead of trying to win....

 

[MCR74]

I'll be surprised if Tavares, Marner and Keefe are with the Leafs come October.

Fine by me. Let Marner collect his cheque somewhere else.

 

[Foppberg]

If they don’t do anything crazy what they do need to do is change the kind of defenders they target. They’ve always gone with the defensive defensemen for their bargain bin shopping but they need more puck movers. Even just the Sean Walkers of the world, not necessarily these big names.

 

[Perfect_Drug]

They lost because of bad coaching.

Keefe is a Babcock clone who can't win in the new NHL. You need to adapt for each opponent and each game.

Grindy defensive players are great for some teams, but it's like the LA kings trying to play their infamous 1-3-1 with a 5'9" Arvidsson? 5'8" Lizotte, and skill guys like Kempe.

Patrick Kane had space in the post season. He never played a grindy defense first game.
Kucherov did too. Marchessault won the Smythe last year.

Heck he explained in full how the coaches exploited Edmonton's system to give him space away from defenders.

Marchessault spilled the beans on exactly how Vegas knew it could beat Edmonton

Are Skinner, Nurse and Ceci getting too much blame? Definitely

edmontonjournal.com

Does Keefe do this?
Nope. Keefe does the old Babcock thing, where he makes everyone play a grindy defensive game predicated on clogging the neutral zone and winning board battles.


I mean it's pretty f***ing dumb. but you guys went back to him 5 years in a row.

Go ahead and gut your team.
It'll be fun watching Marner rip it up in the playoffs on a contender. We saw Hyman get skunked in the first round year after year in Toronto. He's been ripping it up for us in Edmonton the past 3 years in the playoffs. 7 goals in 5 games this year.

 

[Blue Shakehead]

You said they were injured in games down the stretch. Matthews played in Games 1, 2 (and dominated, I might add), and 3, so how was he hurt down the stretch? He got sick then got hurt in Game 4. Nylander had migraines, that would have made it difficult for anyone to play, so how was he hurt down the stretch? You're just making shit up and passing it off as truth.

Ticket prices are a whole different topic but I'd add that you can get into the building for far less than that (as I do every year), so spare me the nonsense.

Yep, just a huge coincidence then that everyone is injured but were perfectly fine for game 82. All these mysterious injuries that they won't tell us about were definitely off-ice incidents. Nothing to see here guys.

If you believe that, I have $850 playoff tickets to sell you for round 2 of next year.

 

[Perfect_Drug]

Here's Toronto 2nd, in the league for goals scored.
Trying to win in the playoffs with defense-first against a better defensive team.

How f***ing dumb does your coach have to be to go with that approach.

Notice how the 2 of the top 3 Goals-Against teams are out? because they brought a water pistol to a gun fight.

If Mitch Marner and Auston Matthews aren't able to get clean looks, then that's on coaching.


But bring Keefe back for a 6th year!
We all love watching Marner fail as a grindy defensive winger!

 

[Fatass]

Trading Marner isn’t the answer. He will be great on another club and might even push his new team over the top and get a Cup (like Kessel and Kadri). The Leafs need to keep their core intact. They were very close with Boston. And Boston is really good.

 

[Fatass]

Here's Toronto 2nd, in the league for goals scored.
Trying to win in the playoffs with defense-first against a better defensive team.

How f***ing dumb does your coach have to be to go with that approach.
View attachment 866391


Notice how the 2 of the top 3 Goals-Against teams are out? because they brought a water pistol to a gun fight.

View attachment 866395


If Mitch Marner and Auston Matthews aren't able to get clean looks, then that's on coaching.

Love to Bruce Boudreau behind the Leafs’ bench.

 

[Rob Brown]

Yep, just a huge coincidence then that everyone is injured but were perfectly fine for game 82. All these mysterious injuries that they won't tell us about were definitely off-ice incidents. Nothing to see here guys.

If you believe that, I have $850 playoff tickets to sell you for round 2 of next year.

Are you dense? Three guys were injured, not everyone, and Matthews was clearly fine for Games 1 and 2 and no one suspected anything after Game 3 either. Not everything is some big conspiracy like you are implying.

And I went to all three home games in Round 2 last year and didn't pay anything close to $850 per ticket. I love the ignorance. Keep trying, pal.

 

[Strangle]

Habs fan with opinions on their real favorite team, the Toronto maple leafs

 

[Roshi]

Nah. This reminds me of my Caps in the 2010s. Really good team that just couldnt gel it together in the playoffs. But they were on the right track. All it takes is one random year that the stars align.

Instead of ”keep it going” Caps panicked, they decided to overreact and invent the wheel again. Hired Dale ”defence wins” Hunter who made prime Ovechkin into fourth line grinder and ended up wasting years of the cores prime pulling all kind of rabbits out of their sleeves.

What eventually got it done wasnt a magic trick. Is happened after they settled down again and let it roll, even if it was once again so close when they were close firing Trotz just few months earlier.

What im saying, overreacting and overcorrecting very rarely works. Leafs has highly talented lineup with plenty of years left on the cores prime. You build around it, dont crash it.

And when you finally get there all these failures make it just feel that much better.

 

[stealth1]

Here's Toronto 2nd, in the league for goals scored.
Trying to win in the playoffs with defense-first against a better defensive team.

How f***ing dumb does your coach have to be to go with that approach.
View attachment 866391


Notice how the 2 of the top 3 Goals-Against teams are out? because they brought a water pistol to a gun fight.

View attachment 866395


If Mitch Marner and Auston Matthews aren't able to get clean looks, then that's on coaching.

Laugh all you want but they tried playing run and gun in the playoffs previous seasons with this core and they couldn't score playing that way either. It's not all on the coach, the core 4 just doesn't have that next gear when it comes to the playoffs.

 

[Fatass]

Are you dense? Three guys were injured, not everyone, and Matthews was clearly fine for Games 1 and 2 and no one suspected anything after Game 3 either. Not everything is some big conspiracy like you are implying.

And I went to all three home games in Round 2 last year and didn't pay anything close to $850 per ticket. I love the ignorance. Keep trying, pal.

Did the Leafs have three home games in round two last year?

 

[Rob Brown]

Did the Leafs have three home games in round two last year?

Yes.

 

[iCanada]

I thought it was more of a god complex, tbh.

 

[Galaxydoggystyle]

I would just get Torts behind the bench and see what happens either the players respond or we get an excellent show between the core 4 and Torts lol

 

[Perfect_Drug]

Laugh all you want but they tried playing run and gun in the playoffs previous seasons with this core and they couldn't score playing that way either. It's not all on the coach, the core 4 just doesn't have that next gear when it comes to the playoffs.

I posted this in another thread.

This was Bosers goal vs Nashville the other day


What made this funny as shit was it's 1:1 a carbon copy of a goal the Oilers scored on them the year before:
(This one has the analysis of how it happened, crossing LH defenders with RH defenders to open up lanes, and then driving to the middle to open up passing lane to the side).


What this means is that the Canucks were so impressed with how the Oilers scored that goal, they practiced it, and decided to use that moment as an opportunity to run that play (like they do in football).

Believe it or not, not all goals are scored by screened shots bouncing in traffic while scrambling for rebounds.

Draisaitl has a "spot" he likes to shoot from which is way off to the side, below the redline. EVERYONE knows this and they can do very little to stop it for several reasons.

1) He's way out of the play, defenders in rigid systems won't cover him because he's not a threat from there.


The problem is, he's way out of the peripheral view of the goalie, so when a blind pass quickly goes there, the goalie is never expecting a one-timer from that angle.

Literally the same shot same spot scored last series (He's scored dozens like this).


He dares the defender to try and cover him to open up more space for McDavid.
The Kings were the 2nd best defensive team in the league last year getting absolutely torched.

Do the Leafs have the personnel for this?
Yup!

These are almost all "set plays" designed to create space for McDavid and open looks for Draisaitl and Hyman.

Keefe doesn't coach in a way to let the players create plays, crossing over defenders to their off-hand, getting behind the box formation, opening up passing lanes, or or stretching out the coverage. He coaches the entire team to play the exact same way, personnel be damned. "Durrrrp clog up neutral zone, battle for pucks along the boards" duuurp. Get it in deep, create scrambles out frunt".

Someone is gonna take Marner off your hands for a few grindy defensive first players, and Marner is gonna thrive on a contender that creates set plays that give him time and space to do what he does best. And everyone is gonna laugh when that happens.


BTW thanks for Hyman. He scored 7 for us in that first round. Believe it or not, he's actually a better scorer than the grindy defense-first winger you tried turning him into.


I also love how the Series Winning Goal in overtime was scored on a SET PLAY that was clearly practiced.


Absolutely delicious

 

[Tryblot]

I don't understand why everyone thought the bruins were going to get demolished in the second round. They're a good team that lost out on first place in the last week of the season by 1 point.