How is this possible with all their high picks and Tavares. A good example that tanking may lead to nothing.
They did the tanking well there the last couple of years, imo. They shot themselves in the foot with those awful contracts - albeit they all are great players, but having 3 players take up more than 1/3 of the whole teams cap hit is terrible. It leads to them not having depth and that is only logical that the team just wears down and lacks consistency.
They have to wait for the cap to go up significantly.
Lol they really payed for Marleau - big bucks. Ended up trading away their first to get rid of him and while he was in Toronto, Marleau said in many interviews that he always reminds Matthews and Marner to not let anybody tell them they are not great. They both ended up with one of the biggest contracts in the league. Marleau screwed up the Leafs