Jake Gardiner vs Tyson Barrie

[Green Snow Storm]

Gardiner pre back injury was a much better defenceman than Barrie. Don't @ me.

 

[Zybalto]

Gards pre back injury was a solid two way D.

Watching him this year you can see why he didnt get what was expected. Looks like a shell of himself out there.

 

[m1ker]

Gardiner has played more games for the leafs and played with better defence and a defensive system. Barrie is new to the team and playing with the most unlikeable team and the worst defensive structure in years. Its not fair to make the comparison so early even Reilly looks garbage this year. I think we need to have Barrie on the team for 3 more years to have a fair comparison or you need to consider his stats from Colorado.

 

[Al14]

I'd vote both of them to the Robidas Island!

Gardiner plays way more scared than Barrie. Barrie actually hustles back to retrieve pucks in our D zone. Gardiner lally gagged his way back almost always losing the race to the puck to the opponent hoping to avoid being hit. His real bad concussion caused this IMHO.

 

[ToneDog]

Pick your poison. Never thought Barrie was brutal in his own end. Jake made some huge blunders though.

 

[IPS]

man where was all this Gardiner love when he was actually on the team? This guy got trashed non-stop when he was a Leaf.

Unbelievable

 

[egd27]

Well the GM valued their poor defensive abilities enough to keep them around until their contracts expire(d), and it seemed no other team wanted them for a playoff run......so I vote for a tie.

 

[SeaOfBlue]

You're shifting goalposts now... you said that he was bad on the PK, and I showed you stats showing otherwise.

Also, only 12 defensmen played 1000 PK minutes over that 5 year span, so you're exagerating there too.

I'm not saying Gardiner is an elite PKer, all I'm saying is he could at least be trusted there. NO chance in hell would Barrie be trusted there.

Gardiner was significantly better (especially defensively) for the Leafs than any season of Barrie's career. Its not even close.

I am not shifting goalposts, I am disproving your point.

From 14/15-18/19, Gardiner played 122.3 minutes. Gave up 10 GA.
From 14/15-18/19, Barrie played 138.7 minutes. Gave up 15 GA.

First of all, Barrie played more minutes in that 5 year period than Gardiner did. More importantly, there is a lesson in the danger of small sample sizes. Gardiner's sample size is driven up mostly by one really good season where he only gave up 1 GA in 26 minutes. Really awesome, except the goalie's save percentage was an unsustainable 95.5%. Conversely, Barrie's is driven down by one where the SV% was 70%, which is very low. Chances are, neither of those numbers would have been sustained over larger sample sizes.

The main determining factor is that really, neither of them were trusted with PK opportunities. In a game where at least 4, if not 5, of your defensemen are given a decent amount of PK time in a season, neither were really trusted to be one of those 4 or 5 over the bulk of their careers. A couple of seasons they were maybe the #5 guy. If they were even remotely decent at PK, we wouldn't be talking about a rather negligible 25 minutes per season on average, especially when both of their GA/60 numbers on the PK are not terrible.

 

[Once]

It depends on how or what you are measuring, but Barrie produces and is better offensively. I'd like to see what he brings in the playoffs to compare, as Gardiner is documented for crumbling under pressure.

I think Gardiner played Babcock's structure, while Barrie has the green light based on Keefe's system. Who knows, perhaps Gardiner would generate more under Keefe. All things being equal, I prefer the RHD.

 

[Primary Assist]

Barrie can be frustrating because he'll pinch at a bad time or get too aggressive in the offensive zone and either cause a turnover or his missed coverage will lead to the puck coming back the wrong way.

Gardiner was frustrating because he would literally just give the puck away to attacking forwards in our own zone, particularly at the most inopportune times.

TL;DR Barrie makes me say dammit, Gardiner made me say WTF

 

[SeaOfBlue]

I would still say the answer is neither. If you are trusting either to play defensively, you are not in a good position.

 

[yubbers]

man where was all this Gardiner love when he was actually on the team? This guy got trashed non-stop when he was a Leaf.

Unbelievable

My dislike had been consistent but he really was better than Barrie as a leaf. Small sample

 

[Erdinger]

Time to move on. We got Jake's best years. Re-signing him would have been crazy

 

[Rants Mulliniks]

Was having a discussion with a friend about our defensive issues and we started talking about still not having a real shut down defender and the season that Barrie has had/comparisons to Gardiner.

Anyways having had both Gardiner and Barrie on our blue line now, who is/was the better D-Man for us ?

Funny in a way because a year or so before acquiring Barrie I was not interested in any of the "Barrie to Toronto" trade proposals because to me he was just another version of Gardiner and someone who would likely command more on the market than their actual worth.

 

[TakeTheBody]

Jake.

easy.

 

[Toronto makebeleifs]

3 yrs ago gards was awesome. Now? He's significantly worse than Barrie. I think his back issues are alot worse than originally thought and his skating has dropped off, which was his best weapon. Barrie is good, he just hasn't fit

 

[KuleminFan41]

2016/17- 2018/19, 5 vs 5, GA/60 of the Leafs
Gardiner- 2.01
Hainsey- 2.49
Zaitsev- 2.64
Rielly- 2.83

If Gardiner was so terrible defensively, then why did the team allowed significantly fewer goals against when he was on ice compare to the rest of the Leafs' top 4 for the most part of the last 3 seasons? You can make a case the Gardiner was guilty of making that occasional, costly turnover but for the large part of the Babcock era Leafs, Gardiner was a very competent 2nd pairing D on offence, defence and especially on the transition.

As for Gardiner being a perennial playoff choke, well that wasn't a thing until his horrible game 7 against Boston 2 seasons ago, prior to that, he actually had a more than decent performance against a very tough Caps team a season prior and was arguably the Leafs best D against the Bruins prior to his game 7 meltdown. I'm not sure how much stock we can put during last year's playoffs as Gardiner was clearly nursing a serious injury and from what I gathered about his performance this season thus far, he hasn't gotten back to his old pre-injury self ever since, but that shouldn't take away from what he actually achieved during his more productive years with the Leafs.

Probably because Gardiner wasn't continually played against the opposing teams top lines, while Rielly and Hainsey were. Gardiner this season is a 3rd line defencemen , playing nearly 4 minutes less in a more defensively structured team and is a -21(dead last by 14), which would be his second worse in his career. Now, don't get me wrong, +- is not the be all end all for defensive statistics, but it gives you at least a decent idea and that's really bad, especially when you know how Carolina plays.

 

[Hockey Talker29]

Well not exactly true in either case.

Tyson Barrie is currently #2 in ES minutes/GP behind Morgan Rielly, who is just playing a ridiculous amount of minutes in general this year (24:15 vs. 21:37 for Barrie). He's playing more ES minutes/GP than Muzzin. Is Barrie not sheltered this year then? It is absolutely possible to be sheltered at ES and still be high in ES ice time; it just means you are playing in more of the favourable situations.

Also, Gardiner was usually playing less ES minutes than Rielly. 3/4 years under Babcock, Rielly played more ES minutes on average than Gardiner, the only exception being Gardiner's career year in 2017-2018. Gardiner was fully developed as a defender by that time, while Rielly was still pretty young.

Honestly this should not even be a debate. Neither should be on this team when we are looking at their defensive capabilities, or in general since we have a plus version in Rielly on our team, but Barrie at least brings more of the offense and a RH shot that is capable of playing huge minutes.

I never said Barrie was sheltered. He hasn't been. It is not realistically possible to be sheltered and play the most even-strength minutes. As I noted "You can argue that he didn't play the toughest minutes, but the difference between the toughest and Gardiner's minutes would be very small." Same applies to Barrie.

I'm not sure where you are getting your numbers from, but Gardiner played more at 5v5 than Rielly (per Natural Stat Trick). Perhaps Rielly had an edge in 4v4 and 3v3 in OT? Maybe. Either way, the point is their minutes were about even. Jake wasn't sheltered.

Also, you seem to be indicating that Rielly was too young to take more ES minutes than Gardiner in 2017-18, but not too young in 2016-17, which makes no logical sense.

 

[lebdafor norris]

Because he was not trusted to handle any of the shutdown situations that the other guys had to. Hainsey and Zaitsev were usually on the ice against top competition in key situations where we needed to prevent a goal, and Rielly was our #1D so even if he was used more offensively, it was against the other team's best guys more often than not.

Defensively, I would pick neither. Both suck defensively, but in their own ways. I think Barrie on any given night is never great, but is still much better than the lows that Gardiner had far too often, while Gardiner is wildly unpredictable with high highs and low lows. I really do not know which I would pick, but if I were his partner, I think I would rather just pick the guy who is simply incapable. At least you know what you are getting on any given night and how to prepare for it, and which parts of the guys' game you know you will have to cover for every night.

When it comes down to it, both need to be heavily sheltered, pure offensive defensemen to be effective, so I am far more concerned with what they can bring offensively and offensively, the choice is easily Barrie. Gardiner's best offensive season barely cracks Barrie's top 5, with this year even being close to Gardiner's best offensive season despite Barrie being practically useless under Babcock for the first like 20 games of this year. Carolina may give Gardiner one more season to get his crap together, or else Gardiner may end up getting Shattenkirk'ed and fighting for his life in the NHL.

C'mon man, this is the Leafs board, everyone here knows Gardiner played a ton of 5 vs 5 minutes (tied with Rielly in avg, 5 vs 5 min last season) for the Leafs and everyone knows Babcock didn't sheltered him like he did Dermott, instead, Gardiner legit got 2nd pairing QOC. Yes I do admit that Hainsey and Rielly got tougher minutes as these guys were the Leafs 1st pair and had to face the top line for most of the nights but even if you take that into consideration, the numbers Gardiner put up still heavily suggest that he was a very reliable defensive Dman for the Leafs.

 

[Suntouchable13]

Barrie was supposed to be a tier above Gardiner. Just did not work out.

 

[lebdafor norris]

Probably because Gardiner wasn't continually played against the opposing teams top lines, while Rielly and Hainsey were. Gardiner this season is a 3rd line defencemen , playing nearly 4 minutes less in a more defensively structured team and is a -21(dead last by 14), which would be his second worse in his career. Now, don't get me wrong, +- is not the be all end all for defensive statistics, but it gives you at least a decent idea and that's really bad, especially when you know how Carolina plays.

We are not talking about the declining Jake Gardiner of today, Gardiner before his unfortunate back problems played legit top 4 minutes for the Leafs and played a lot of 5 vs 5 minutes to boot (tied for Rielly in TOI/G last year). How many 2nd pairing Dman in the league gives up, on average, .82 goals less per 60 compare to the team's highly though of #1 D, yet said 2nd pairing Dman still gets called a defensive liability?

A lot of the Gardiner criticism here is just ridiculous, people buries him because of that 1 visible turnover he makes every 2 weeks or so and just completely ignores all the other effective things he did during his time here, e.g., zone entry defence.

 

[I am Canadian]

Gardiner was frustrating for brain farts but Barrie is on another level imo.

It does take into account we lost Kadri for him but I've never seen a defenseman uncapable of understanding what to do on a 2 on 1..

YOU TAKE THE PASS. He stands in-between and doesn't pressure the shooter or take away the pass. I've seen it waaaaaaaay too many times.

 

[Smif]

Tie goes to the RHD.

 

[TimeZone]

Neither.

I preferred young Gards, but Barrie as underwhelming as he's been is definitely superior to the dumpster fire Gards was last year.

 

[Jeffrey Pedler]

Barrie's best offensive year was better than Gardiner's. They're both bad defensively.