As a short guy myself I admire Gerbe and this is awesome:
Teams we want to win tonight, by my calculations
Pittsburgh
Canadiens
Flyers
Kings
We are now on the outside looking in
We're playing like ass right now so many here have decided that to make themselves feel better they'll get back to ripping JT two years after the fact when the truth is most of those now doing so were crying in their soup the day he left. And for the record, if it wasn't John Tavares but some guy named Joe Smith and he had the skillset that JT has right now, you'd all cream in your soup if we could get him (though not for $11M).
James Mirtle is on pace to be the first person I block on TwitterThe Leafs are BACK everyone!
We're playing like ass right now so many here have decided that to make themselves feel better they'll get back to ripping JT two years after the fact when the truth is most of those now doing so were crying in their soup the day he left. And for the record, if it wasn't John Tavares but some guy named Joe Smith and he had the skillset that JT has right now, you'd all cream in your soup if we could get him (though not for $11M).
So if the Islanders resigned John Tavares we never would have hated him? Wow... This is a revolutionary thought process!
You missed the point completely. Much of the conversation has turned not to his betrayal but to saying in essence that he's not a very good hockey player and my point was that that kind of thinking is idiotic we would kill for a player with JTs exact skillset right about now. Again, not for JT, but for player who can do exactly what JT does.So if the Islanders resigned John Tavares we never would have hated him? Wow... This is a revolutionary thought process!
You missed the point completely. Much of the conversation has turned not to his betrayal but to saying in essence that he's not a very good hockey player and my point was that that kind of thinking is idiotic we would kill for a player with JTs exact skillset right about now. Again, not for JT, but for player who can do exactly what JT does.
It's more about the fact that we loved him for what he was with us and didn't rip him, but for TML fans he's apparently not good enough. They're the ones ripping their own guy - we never did that.You missed the point completely. Much of the conversation has turned not to his betrayal but to saying in essence that he's not a very good hockey player and my point was that that kind of thinking is idiotic we would kill for a player with JTs exact skillset right about now. Again, not for JT, but for player who can do exactly what JT does.
Read through the thread and you'll find that there are a lot of people to whom it is clearly not obvious. Though more likely it's willful blindness. Hate on him all you want, hell, I've hated the Leafs my whole life and more so now because he's there, but when people deny his ability, the same ones who wept when he left, it's moronic.Yeah obviously he is a good hockey player, I think everyone knows that. People are just rooting for the destruction of his career.
Correct. This is the kind of thing I was getting at in my post above. I don't think Isles fans are saying Tavares isn't a great player, they're just enjoying the fact that he's not what Leafs fans imagined he was.Of all the things that Leaf fans are suddenly being critical of Tavares for, I'm baffled why his skating is the one they're only just now catching on to. Even at his absolute peak, his skating was no better than about average.
Did they think they were getting a McDavid/MacKinnon/Barzal level skater and suddenly he just lost his wheels within the past 12 months?
Correct. This is the kind of thing I was getting at in my post above. I don't think Isles fans are saying Tavares isn't a great player, they're just enjoying the fact that he's not what Leafs fans imagined he was.
The difference is people did criticize him for things like backchecking when he was here, that wasn’t new. The difference is he no longer has the shield of being the golden child here, so rather than criticism being mitigated, it’s magnified 10 fold because he’s a jackass. He’s a good hockey player, no doubt, but I hate him as a hockey player because of what he didRead through the thread and you'll find that there are a lot of people to whom it is clearly not obvious. Though more likely it's willful blindness. Hate on him all you want, hell, I've hated the Leafs my whole life and more so now because he's there, but when people deny his ability, the same ones who wept when he left, it's moronic.
He's a bit of an outlier when it comes to superstars/elite players as his skills aren't necessarily elite - at least not across the board. His hockey sense and intangibles are some of the things that propelled him to stardom as a youth and with the Islanders but that was largely on account of him being the big swinging dick in the room. In some sense with the leafs, its a diminishing returns type situation. With the amount of skill around him, they don't really have as much a need for what Tavares brings as opposed to a relatively undermanned Islander squad over the years he was here. And his relative shortcomings are more magnified with the talent around him. He's still a very good player and will get his goals, but they don't necessarily need what he brings - at least, not at an $11m cap hit.The difference is people did criticize him for things like backchecking when he was here, that wasn’t new. The difference is he no longer has the shield of being the golden child here, so rather than criticism being mitigated, it’s magnified 10 fold because he’s a jackass. He’s a good hockey player, no doubt, but I hate him as a hockey player because of what he did
Of all the things that Leaf fans are suddenly being critical of Tavares for, I'm baffled why his skating is the one they're only just now catching on to. Even at his absolute peak, his skating was no better than about average.
Did they think they were getting a McDavid/MacKinnon/Barzal level skater and suddenly he just lost his wheels within the past 12 months?