Around the League Thread | Full Arenas Edition

[MS]

Vegas will obviously rebound. They're an elite team dealing with a lot of injuries.

Toronto, it will be interesting to see if they need a coaching change. I think they'll be in the mix at the end of the season but there are obviously some issues there.

 

[StreetHawk]

Campbell was killing it before that Pittsburgh game. It happens. I actually quite like the Mrazek/Campbell duo but it's a fair point about the injury concerns. Hilariously, Carolina picked up Andersen (also made of glass) and he's been on fire. They also picked up Raanta (made of ... something more breakable than glass?)

I think the Leafs will be fine. It's super fun to watch them implode though.

And neither of the Leafs young goalies are close to being ready even at ages 22/23. Scott missed all of 19-20 with injuries. So he’s behind a year on his development. Woll has a GAA of high 3’s through 2 pro seasons in the A.

 

[Melvin]

None of TB/Vegas/Colorado/Toronto have had good starts. It's too early to be meaningful, but interesting. Cale Makar is a delightful -8 through 5 games.

 

[F A N]

Nothing that the leafs have done in at least like three seasons has been directed by analytics. A bunch of terrible moves.

Dubas has just been unable to properly surround the core pieces he has has in place. Bunch of bad fits all over the lineup and they’ve had this issue for years now.

They could be making moves "directed" by analytics and still make terrible moves. Or they might use analytics to confirm certain players. Chayka in Arizona was suppose to be at the forefront of analytics too, but while there were hits (Garland) there have been some massive misses as well. Certainly, the Leafs haven't acquired players that were under the radar and gotten good value out of them like the way Carolina and Colorado have.

Maybe Dubas isn't listening to Gilman when Gilman told him no?

 

[mathonwy]

I thought they looked like Vegas usually looks. Controlled the play. Controlled the shot share. Controlled the chances.

Ran into a tough team with a hot goalie.

That’s what a game between two well coached teams. It didn’t look too different and they’re missing by far their two most prolific offensive forwards.

Sorokin was nuts.

 

[krutovsdonut]

The team has gotten incrementally worse each passing year that Dubas has been GM.

i think they will turn it around for the regular season, but they blew their contender window by signing tavares. they do not have the drafting or cap or pro scouting skills to be able to shed as many players as they have done and stay in the hunt.

 

[krutovsdonut]

i watched the second period of the vegas/isles game. i thought the isles looked good. not sure how long vegas will play that hard without results.

 

[krutovsdonut]

Did Dubas really go and build the team in the image he wanted? Thought he was the new school guy, heavy into analytics and puck possession.
Major downfall for him was his contract negotiations with his RFAs. Should have known his weaknesses and delegated to someone who could handle it. Lou Lam wouldn’t have given their kids that kind of contract. New gm like Dubas couldn’t handle the media and fan heat during those negotiations and gave in too much.

i think the rfa problems came from them paying tavares so much. not that tavares was not a market deal, but it created an internal salary structure for the team which forced them to pay matthews which then led to the marner and nylander debacles.

they need to move matthews or marner to solve their cap problems.

 

[StreetHawk]

i think the rfa problems came from them paying tavares so much. not that tavares was not a market deal, but it created an internal salary structure for the team which forced them to pay matthews which then led to the marner and nylander debacles.

they need to move matthews or marner to solve their cap problems.

Completely agree. Tavares was a luxury add that they didn’t need. Had it been Hedman or a big time Dman, that would have been fine but to pay $11 mill to an outsider to do what Mathews and Marner do and expect them to accept getting paid paid 2/3 that out the Leafs in a terrible spot with their cap structure.

 

[Nucker101]

One Dubas signing I'm jealous of is Bunting, would've been sweet to have him, he fits in well in that same Garland/Hoglander mold of a smaller forward who plays a hard-nosed game and has skill as well. But I get why he signed in Toronto, it's his hometown team, the Dubas OHL connection, and he was probably told that he'd be given a chance to play with one of Tavares/Matthews. Makes way more sense than signing up for 3rd line minutes here

 

[sting101]

Toronto screwed themselves with the spending on the core 4.

By Comparison last year Matthews 23 Marner 23 Tavares 30 Nylander 24 = 49.7 % of the cap
in 2011/12 when Kane and Toews were the same age Toews 23 Kane 23 Hossa 33 Sharp 29 = *33.9% of the cap ( adjusted 37.9% )
* you do have to consider that the Hossa contract was a cap circumvention and would of likely come in around 7.5-8 million which would have meant the cap % would have been the adjusted amount ( I used 8 )

The Hawks had already won a championship and went on to win 2 more because they were not paying a stupid amount of money for it's top4 forwards ( it still cost them some good players) 11.8 % of 81.5 = 9.7 million to spend on their roster on top of league minimums 750k x 2 = 11.3 million......that's how badly Toronto's front office fxxxxd themselves.

Hyman at 5.5 and C.Brown at 3.6 would have easily been retained and may have taken a little less even and it would have still left money for a 3 million dollar player like Kapanen to stay or a veteran defenseman or stud goalie depending how they balanced it.

In fact doing the math they could have Markstrom Hyman Brown Kapanen = 18.3 for
Mrazek Ritchie Kase Kampf = 9 + *9.7 = 18.7 *if they had the same percent as the Hawks did.

Those contracts have killed 2 yrs already of competing and will likely need a couple more at least to get to a point where they can have enough money to spread through the lineup to have a solid team.

 

[MS]

Toronto has never properly replaced Kadri.

Guy is an absolute idiot but is a top drawer high-leverage defensive C when he's on form.

 

[Vector]

Toronto has never properly replaced Kadri.

Guy is an absolute idiot but is a top drawer high-leverage defensive C when he's on form.

Or suspended. I wonder what the over/under for the amount of games he gets suspended for this year is.

 

[krutovsdonut]

Completely agree. Tavares was a luxury add that they didn’t need. Had it been Hedman or a big time Dman, that would have been fine but to pay $11 mill to an outsider to do what Mathews and Marner do and expect them to accept getting paid paid 2/3 that out the Leafs in a terrible spot with their cap structure.

and now the whole league has paid the price. the combined market salary demands of ufas and rfas coming off elcs now exceed the capacity of the salary cap. which likely means the ufas will pay the price, since they are optional.

in a couple of years we may see a team profit by loading up on cheap ufas.

 

[Melvin]

Toronto has never properly replaced Kadri.

Guy is an absolute idiot but is a top drawer high-leverage defensive C when he's on form.

Remember how 95% of people thought Colorado got “fleeced?”

 

[deckercky]

Remember how 95% of people thought Colorado got “fleeced?”

No.

 

[F A N]

i think the rfa problems came from them paying tavares so much. not that tavares was not a market deal, but it created an internal salary structure for the team which forced them to pay matthews which then led to the marner and nylander debacles.

they need to move matthews or marner to solve their cap problems.

Completely agree. Tavares was a luxury add that they didn’t need. Had it been Hedman or a big time Dman, that would have been fine but to pay $11 mill to an outsider to do what Mathews and Marner do and expect them to accept getting paid paid 2/3 that out the Leafs in a terrible spot with their cap structure.

Tavares was a UFA though and the Leafs paid Matthews more for his RFA years. I don't think Tavares' contract impacted or should have impacted Matthews' contract. Matthews was then a 40+ goal over point per game #1 C. McDavid and Eichel's have already signed so you know the range where Matthews AAV should be at if he's signing for the same term. Marner's contract is the bigger problem. Panarin is the only winger with a higher cap hit.

I think that once Tavares was signed, they should have traded Nylander for defensive help. I don't think anyone would argue that between Matthews, Marner, and Nylander, you trade Nylander at the time. Kadri was on a relatively affordable contract and for a team looking to win the Cup, Kadri was a better fit as the team's 3C than Nylander.

So I don't think signing Tavares was a problem. On a team looking to win the Cup, who wouldn't take Matthews and Tavares over Matthews and Nylander + cap savings? Let's not forget that Nylander was having his own struggles in the playoffs prior to last season.

 

[4Twenty]

Toronto quite clearly was the team most impacted by the pandemics effects on the leagues salary cap.


All the griping about Nylander’s deal look stupid. He’s well worth that.

Only getting 1 and 2 UFA years from Austin and Mitch were the biggest issues with those deals. Not so much the cap hits.

 

[deckercky]

As long as they get goaltending, they'll be a decent playoff contender. I still think they top-out in the second round unless a bunch of guys breakout.

Edmonton forwards are very solid - the team is finally able to fill in depth behind the big two. Hyman was always going to be a solid short-term signing with questions down the line.

Defence has some questions obviously, and are very vulnerable to injuries, but have been good enough with the strong forward support.

I keep waiting for the shoe to drop with Smith - he should not be this good, but he's maintained his play now for a long time (his play with Edmonton is probably the most consistent stretch of his career).

 

[Peen]

They could be making moves "directed" by analytics and still make terrible moves. Or they might use analytics to confirm certain players. Chayka in Arizona was suppose to be at the forefront of analytics too, but while there were hits (Garland) there have been some massive misses as well. Certainly, the Leafs haven't acquired players that were under the radar and gotten good value out of them like the way Carolina and Colorado have.

Maybe Dubas isn't listening to Gilman when Gilman told him no?

chayka was universally denounced by the analytics community lol

 

[StreetHawk]

Toronto quite clearly was the team most impacted by the pandemics effects on the leagues salary cap.


All the griping about Nylander’s deal look stupid. He’s well worth that.

Only getting 1 and 2 UFA years from Austin and Mitch were the biggest issues with those deals. Not so much the cap hits.

They go hand in hand. Eichel at $10 mill for 8 years. McDavid at $12.5 mill for 8 years. Mathews at $11.6 mill for 5 doesn’t make sense.

At 8 years it makes sense. At 5 years then something closer to $9 mill makes sense.

same with Marner. He’s almost $11 mill for 6 years. Closer to $9 mill for that term.

 

[deckercky]

Tavares was a UFA though and the Leafs paid Matthews more for his RFA years. I don't think Tavares' contract impacted or should have impacted Matthews' contract. Matthews was then a 40+ goal over point per game #1 C. McDavid and Eichel's have already signed so you know the range where Matthews AAV should be at if he's signing for the same term.

Matthews contract would have been fine at that AAV for 8 years based on McDavid and Eichel. 5 years for that amount was ridiculous. If this season is wasted (obviously lots of time to get on track), next season gets tougher due to many expiring contracts (including several RFAs). The team likely loses Rielly and gets no better, and only has two more years until Matthews is UFA.

Marner contract was just a reaction to everyone else being signed to huge contracts - how could they pay their highest scorer substantially less?

 

[Bubbles]

chayka was universally denounced by the analytics community lol

Really? I guess he stopped using it when he became a GM.

He was a pioneer of analytics before. Gillis actually hired his company back in the day.

 

[4Twenty]

They go hand in hand. Eichel at $10 mill for 8 years. McDavid at $12.5 mill for 8 years. Mathews at $11.6 mill for 5 doesn’t make sense.

At 8 years it makes sense. At 5 years then something closer to $9 mill makes sense.

same with Marner. He’s almost $11 mill for 6 years. Closer to $9 mill for that term.

Those guys had better track records than Eichel.

The idea that McDavid’s deal was meant to be the top deal in the league for the length of it was silly and the only reason it may end up being the case is the pandemic.

 

[Melvin]

No.

Then take a trip down memory lane my good chum

Around the League: 2019 Offseason | Page 14 | HFBoards - NHL Message Board and Forum for National Hockey League (mandatory.com)