Randy Randerson
Registered User
Washington is the outlier though, teams built that way are usually winning their cups with their young stars under 25/26, when you're building along this blueprint you're looking to be Pittsburgh/Chicago not Washington.The thing that the Washington Capitals Cup run should have taught us is that there is no singular way to win a Cup. The Caps won their first Cup with a core pushing 30. As for not having the money or high draft picks to supplement the core, that's why you have a scouting staff. A high draft pick is no excuse not to find serviceable talent. A franchise like the Leafs, with the resources at their disposal should not have this issue.
High draft picks are dramatically more likely to yield star caliber talent, and a franchise not being able to get out of the first round with the talent we have may well need more star caliber talent. If finding the next Aho/Kucherov with 2nd round picks is what you're hitching your chances to, you're putting yourself into a situation that you're very unlikely to succeed.
A franchise like the Leafs with the player personnel they have should also not have trouble getting out of the first round, it's been more along the "expected outcome" curve in previous years as we were coming out of a rebuild, but this year needed to be better and the long term huge AAV commitments to a small number of players is going to tie their hands to significantly supplement outside of the draft while also having started to trade away first round picks.
I'm not saying that we're doomed, I'm saying that if there isn't marked improvement next year in the outcome, it will be time to think about cashing in some high value players for a do-over at the rebuild because the management of this team has likely mis-played their hand and will be too cap-committed with too few high ceiling non-roster pieces to really change it.
JVR/Bozak should have been traded for futures, Gardiner maybe as well, none of that would have changed the outcomes in their respective years (except possibly for the better). Nylander and Matthews were probably paid too much, Marner probably will be as well.
And again I want to re-iterate that I'm an optimist, I was as high as anyone on this version of the Leafs being able to contend for a long time. They're starting to really rattle that outlook with their results, and the outlook isn't likely to improve from here as we start to deal from the non-roster asset base and commit huge money to a small number of players. They need to prove they're a championship level team next year, otherwise I think the best course of action for the franchise is to start taking it apart and getting huge futures return for some of the valuable parts so they (probably under new management) can try again.