Nikita Zaitsev isnt as bad as everyone thinks

[Bluelines]

Remember that game where Jake threw a big Mozzaball over to Dion and Dion got completely destroyed, it was kinda funny cause as Jake is passing the puck you can here Jake yell... "WATCH OUT!!!!" ...LOL... We can laugh now cause, that is jake at least a half dozen times each year, big old mozzaball to one of his team mates and then BOOM...

 

[Gallagbi]

Delete

 

[StatsNightHeroes]

Remember that game where Jake threw a big Mozzaball over to Dion and Dion got completely destroyed, it was kinda funny cause as Jake is passing the puck you can here Jake yell... "WATCH OUT!!!!" ...LOL... We can laugh now cause, that is jake at least a half dozen times each year, big old mozzaball to one of his team mates and then BOOM...

Deflect all you want. The reality is that Gardiner is a much better D than Zaitsev by pretty much every metric. For anyone who understands the position and the way the leafs want their D to play the eye test shows Zaitsev to be a disaster. Of course Gardiner is going to make mistakes with the puck, all players do, especially when they are actually trying to make something happen. Zaitsev just blindly fires the puck up the boards over and over again so Gardiner has to breakout every time because if Zaitsev tries it’s back in the leafs zone 5 seconds later.

 

[Kazparov]

Can they send him and Marleau, for eg., to the minors? I think they’d have to pass through waivers and I know there are rules on veterans in rhe AHL but if neither can be traded does it help the cap?
Too lazy to read the CBA

Zaitsev can be sent down, Marleau cannot. Yes he would pass through waivers. He would still he paid NHL salary but it wouldn't all count vs the cap.

In Toronto this is called Robidas island.

 

[Gallagbi]

Zaitsev can be sent down, Marleau cannot. Yes he would pass through waivers. He would still he paid NHL salary but it wouldn't all count vs the cap.

In Toronto this is called Robidas island.

The majority would

 

[Bluelines]

Deflect all you want. The reality is that Gardiner is a much better D than Zaitsev by pretty much every metric. For anyone who understands the position and the way the leafs want their D to play the eye test shows Zaitsev to be a disaster. Of course Gardiner is going to make mistakes with the puck, all players do, especially when they are actually trying to make something happen. Zaitsev just blindly fires the puck up the boards over and over again so Gardiner has to breakout every time because if Zaitsev tries it’s back in the leafs zone 5 seconds later.

It's not that Jake HAS to do the breakouts, its his ROLE to do the break outs. There is no deflection at all.

Remember when Jake had a meltdown in 2 different Boston series that caused us to lose game 7 in both series, yeah that was fun. Sigh....

Jake certainly has his positives but he also has his glaring negatives.

 

[mouser]

Zaitsev can be sent down, Marleau cannot. Yes he would pass through waivers. He would still he paid NHL salary but it wouldn't all count vs the cap.

In Toronto this is called Robidas island.

$3.475m cap hit for Zaitsev in the AHL, not seeing that happen.

 

[Kazparov]

The majority would

You're right, my bad. Robdias island needs injured players to get the cap relief.

 

[StatsNightHeroes]

It's not that Jake HAS to do the breakouts, its his ROLE to do the break outs. There is no deflection at all.

Remember when Jake had a meltdown in 2 different Boston series that caused us to lose game 7 in both series, yeah that was fun. Sigh....

Jake certainly has his positives but he also has his glaring negatives.

It’s not his role to make every breakout pass. Obviously moving the puck is a strength for him but for 4.5 million Zaitsev needs to contribute something besides the PK and coverage on cycle. I don’t understand how anyone can look at that pairing and say Gardiner is the problem.

Nice revisionist history on the Boston series in 2013. The whole team collapsed in that one and were under siege for the final 10 minutes. You can’t blame Gardiner for that.

As for 2018, the minus 5 obviously isn’t a good look but he’s not really at fault for any of the goals. 2 empty netters. The debrusk goal where he actually recovers fairly well and Freddy let’s in a weak one. The pasta goal isn’t on him and the Heinan goal he turns it over but they are in decent positioning until bozak tries to swipe it out of the air. Not a good game from Gardiner but he’s definitely not the only one to blame.

The positives outweigh the negatives with him despite a vocal minority who love to tear him down. I have a hard time seeing any positives for Zaitsev. He’s basically a smoother but less physical Polak.

 

[Bluelines]

It’s not his role to make every breakout pass. Obviously moving the puck is a strength for him but for 4.5 million Zaitsev needs to contribute something besides the PK and coverage on cycle. I don’t understand how anyone can look at that pairing and say Gardiner is the problem.

Nice revisionist history on the Boston series in 2013. The whole team collapsed in that one and were under siege for the final 10 minutes. You can’t blame Gardiner for that.

As for 2018, the minus 5 obviously isn’t a good look but he’s not really at fault for any of the goals. 2 empty netters. The debrusk goal where he actually recovers fairly well and Freddy let’s in a weak one. The pasta goal isn’t on him and the Heinan goal he turns it over but they are in decent positioning until bozak tries to swipe it out of the air. Not a good game from Gardiner but he’s definitely not the only one to blame.

The positives outweigh the negatives with him despite a vocal minority who love to tear him down. I have a hard time seeing any positives for Zaitsev. He’s basically a smoother but less physical Polak.

Absolutely, I totally agree with a guy who missuses the word obtuse and the phrase revisionist history. Poor Flakey Jakey was certainly the hero of game 7. How dare the fans boo the hero of both game 7's!!! Leaf fans have a habit of booing the wrong guy... watch out JT Leaf fans got you on their radar....

 

[StatsNightHeroes]

Absolutely, I totally agree with a guy who missuses the word obtuse and the phrase revisionist history. Poor Flakey Jakey was certainly the hero of game 7. How dare the fans boo the hero of both game 7's!!! Leaf fans have a habit of booing the wrong guy... watch out JT Leaf fans got you on their radar....

I don’t care if you agree with me or not. Coming into the Zaitsev thread to rip on Gardiner while completely ignoring all the valid criticisms of Zaitsev’s game comes off as irrational and immature. The pairing doesn’t work, they need to switch it and at some point I think they will. At which point you’ll need to find a new whipping boy to pin Zaitsev’s poor performance on.

 

[Visnovsky]

Zaitsev has been very good in all of the games he has played away from Gardiner, again today with Dermott.

No need to trade him in my opinion, as hes a prime candidate to rebound with a new partner, and a good option for the Seattle draft.

 

[Finnish your Czech]

He's on the second pairing, but Babs basically plays his line as more of a 1B pairing with Rielly-Hainsey getting 1A minutes, and Dermott-Oz just get scraps. I don't think Dermott is an improvement, but it would be beneficial to the team if they gave Dermott a bit stronger usage to take the load off Gardiner and Zaitsev.

 

[Bluelines]

I don’t care if you agree with me or not. Coming into the Zaitsev thread to rip on Gardiner while completely ignoring all the valid criticisms of Zaitsev’s game comes off as irrational and immature. The pairing doesn’t work, they need to switch it and at some point I think they will. At which point you’ll need to find a new whipping boy to pin Zaitsev’s poor performance on.

HAHA... OK little fella, make up whatever story makes you warm and fuzzy. I ignored Z's weaknesses? In this very thread I said maybe Z's game does not translate well to the NA ice but continue to make up whatever little fantasies that make you happy. When I imply he is not suited for the NHL, does that sound like I'm ignoring his weaknesses?

What is irrational and immature is to intentionally spread false fantasies about another poster. At best you are a lazy poster that makes assumption without doing their homework at worst you an intentional liar.

Dermott had a pretty good game with Z last night eh? Oh and did you see the end to end rush by Z and then he retrieves the puck behind Zona's net and then get back in defensive position... but what was different last night... can't place my finger on it... I can say one thing though, kudos to Jake, he didn't make one bonehead mistake all night, I didn't even notice him at all last night.

 

[Gallagbi]

Struggled last night against a bad Arizona team where we carried the vast majority of the play. More bad options and scrambly play in his own end. That fall behind the net was a perfect summary of his issues.

 

[StatsNightHeroes]

HAHA... OK little fella, make up whatever story makes you warm and fuzzy. I ignored Z's weaknesses? In this very thread I said maybe Z's game does not translate well to the NA ice but continue to make up whatever little fantasies that make you happy. When I imply he is not suited for the NHL, does that sound like I'm ignoring his weaknesses?

What is irrational and immature is to intentionally spread false fantasies about another poster. At best you are a lazy poster that makes assumption without doing their homework at worst you an intentional liar.

Dermott had a pretty good game with Z last night eh? Oh and did you see the end to end rush by Z and then he retrieves the puck behind Zona's net and then get back in defensive position... but what was different last night... can't place my finger on it... I can say one thing though, kudos to Jake, he didn't make one bonehead mistake all night, I didn't even notice him at all last night.

One nice play. Now that Gardiner’s gone and Zaitsev can skate 200 feet with the puck I’ll be sure to put some money on him for the Norris. I’m sure Babcock is thrilled with the close loss to a perennial bottom feeder and Zaitsev’s offensive breakout.

 

[supermann_98]

This guy has found a new gear the the playoffs. Him and Muzzin together has been dynamite.

Suddenly his contract looks ok and maybe our RHD situation isn’t as dire as we all thought it was.

Next year:
Reilly Dermott
Muzzin Zaitsev
Rosen Liljegren (sheltered pairing)

Gards and Hainsey take a UFA hike and Sandin is the first call up with Holl/Ozi playing the 7th Dman role of sitting on the bench and playing 10-15 games.

 

[therealkoho]

It's not that Jake HAS to do the breakouts, its his ROLE to do the break outs. There is no deflection at all.

Remember when Jake had a meltdown in 2 different Boston series that caused us to lose game 7 in both series, yeah that was fun. Sigh....

Jake certainly has his positives but he also has his glaring negatives.

yeppers good ol Jake was showing off those negatives tonight

 

[HomerJLeafs]

I kinda love it that i was right about Zaitsev. The Gardiner-Zaitsev pairing does not work. But i liked Zs game with almost everybody else. The Muzzin-Zaitsev pair is such a beauty.

 

[Semantics]

He's always had better defensive metrics than our other d-men like Rielly. I don't think he's really any better with the puck now, which was a major weakness, but playoffs likely make that less of an issue since forwards are better at coming back and the opponent's forecheckers will play more cautious.

 

[Jozay]

He's been pretty damn good in the playoffs.

 

[DanM]

Z has been playing better from the last few weeks of the regular season, but has been lights out in the playoffs.

I will have to eat some crow here, I was on the "fire Z to the sun" side of things.

He proved me wrong.

 

[Rielly4]

lol you guys are blinded. Zaitsev has been horrible. He was at fault for a ton of goals in game 4 and is just terrible with the puck. The reason Zaitsev is doing decently is because of the 5 man unit he is on the ice with. Literally every single player out there is playing great that hes playing with. Tavares line has been unreal defensively. Zaitsevs only strength is skating and physicality but with the puck hes awful and hes brain dead in defensive coverage situations unless hes pinning someone against the boards.

 

[Tak7]

Title of the thread should actually read:

Nikita Zaitsev has performed so much better than anyone thought he would

 

[Rielly4]

Hes -4 on the playoffs and the only reason he had a "good" game tonight was because he didnt have any glaring mistakes...Its not because he did anything good its because he didnt hurt us. In game 4 he hurt us big time. Lets hope he can manage not to have a horrible mistake in game 6.