Why is Mike Babcock being made the scapegoat for the Maple Leaf's problems?

[bert]

STL has a very solid Dcore

Toronto will never win with the way their roster is constructed. The blue line is too offensive minded and can’t play in their own end.

Doesn’t matter who the coach is IMO

I am not so sure about that. Hard to say until you see them under a new coach that the leafs want to play for. Keefe is a demanding organized progressive coach. I think if they make the switch they will play alot better.

 

[phillydownsouth]

because hes the coach. They have an incredible roster.

Could also be Hakstol, glad Philly dumped his ass

 

[Foghorn Leghorn]

Firing Babcock will not change the fact that they have three players making $10+ million, a complete floater making an additional $7 million, and a defence corps made up of players whose defensive acumen reminds one of an Atom team.

 

[Realgud]

Babcock only winning one Cup with those Red Wings teams should be more of an indictment on him than it is. There's no reason that team should have only won once.

As a wings fan, I wholeheartedly agree with this.

 

[Henkka]

He's one of the most successful coaches in North American Hockey, the coach who holds the record for most wins as the Red Wings coach, numerous Stanley Cup Finals appearances, and took the Red Wings to the playoffs every year he was coach there. The problem with the Leafs appear to be gutless, heartless, spoiled young players and an inexperienced foolish GM. Sad that he's being made the scapegoat. I think they are doing him a favor if they were to let him go.

You nailed it.

 

[Draiskull]

One smart thing the Leafs did was to not name Matthews the captain. Imagine if he was the captain right now the scapegoat would probably not have been the coach.

 

[Henkka]

What if, this all-offensive system and vision Kyle Dubas wanted to build is a killer in salary cap system?

Low scoring controls caphits. This Dubas-plan did nothing that put Toronto Maple Leafs in a cap hell. No one can build a great team with those overpriced stars, when there's NEVER any depth after them. NEVER, until big salaries are traded away. So prepare for poor success, or trades. Maybe for a new rebuild.

That's the change Toronto Maple Leafs will need, not a coaching change. Mike Babcock already did miracles with those Leafs crap rosters. He also did get a heck of an offense out like Dubas visioned. Babcock was too good. But when your Dubas-built defence always had so crap material, it did lead to high-scoring games. High-scoring games Dubas wanted, and which Babcock completed. High-scoring games leading to inflated scoring and cap hell. Bad backup goalies leading to inflated scoring in "easy" games.

A cap hell which Dubas created with his offensive vision, and then as a bonus, zero charisma against player agents in contract negotiations, when you should push the pricetags down after this inflated scoring.

A cap hell = no depth = mediocre success. Offensive stars without a depth and defence. Just like Leafs are now.

Every blind hockey fan can see that problem is the builder = Kyle Dubas.

 

[lorwood]

The leafs offense is really good, and their defense is really bad. Isn't that expected from how their roster is built.

Look how talented their forward core is. Look how un-talented their defensive core is.

Which is exactly how not to build an NHL team. The game has always been the same, you build from the net out. See Barry Trotz.

 

[TOGuy14]

I think the biggest knock on Babcock absolutely has to be the fact that HE NEVER MAKES ADJSUTMENTS

Couple lines playing cold all game? Keeping running them out in the same scheme

Team puts their best line out there? Always go to your grind line because you don't trust your top guys to trade 1:1

Get scored against? Immediately go to your grind line every time

Back to back games? Always Andersen first, backup second NO MATTER WHAT. A couple weeks ago we had a back to back where it was SJ night 1 and MTL night 2. He of course ptus Andy in vs SJ and Hutch in vs MTL which we lost (potential 4 point game against divisional rival).

Babcock is paid to employ some sort of strategy and adjustments in game, of which he does none. Watching him chase some predetermined matchups in the playoffs is infuriating, and his personnel selection is even worse (ie Marleau playing more than Matthews in game 7 thrid period down a goal)

 

[Nithoniniel]

Every blind hockey fan can see that problem is the builder = Kyle Dubas.

Well put.

 

[Nithoniniel]

Which is exactly how not to build an NHL team. The game has always been the same, you build from the net out. See Barry Trotz.

You could also see Penguins during their consecutive Cup wins. They weren't exactly building from the net out. That defense was dragged along kicking and screaming.

 

[joe89]

Once the Red Wings roster started to go from all-star to just good, his coaching started to get exposed and wasn't effective anymore. When bottom players that he loves so much(realgud heavy players) don't do enough, his style falls flat IMO. He's lost a ridiculous amount of close playoff series in the last decade(<.500 win rate) and that can hardly be seen as a fluke anymore. I don't see any real progress in the way he coaches, it's just more of the same of something he hasn't found success with for a long time and with A LOT of different players.

 

[Sypher04]

If the coach isn't responsible for 5v5 play sucking, powerplay sucking and penalty kill sucking, all at the same and for a prolonged period of time, then who is? Yes, the players have a role in this, but let's call a spade a spade. Our coaching staff is simply not getting it done.

Isn't the age old adage that 'you can teach defense, but you can't teach skill', so why is it in 4 years this team still cannot defend worth a damn. Say there are personnel issues all you want, and fair enough, but the coach has also failed.

We regressed last year. We appear to be further regressing this year.
We're below .500 in 2019

It's time to make the change and Dubas has been on the job far shorter a time and aside from a couple mistakes I'm not sure you can call his body of work remotely worthy of firing.

 

[The Grim Reaper]

You could also see Penguins during their consecutive Cup wins. They weren't exactly building from the net out. That defense was dragged along kicking and screaming.

They were built from the opponents net out.

 

[Rabid Ranger]

Dubas the boy blunder deserves more scorn but Babs isn't doing the team any favors with his coaching.

 

[Sypher04]

Dubas the boy blunder deserves more scorn but Babs isn't doing the team any favors with his coaching.

I'm not sure if your comment was meant as Dubas deserves more scorn than Babcock, or just more than he gets. Either way, I'm not sure I agree as Dubas has taken a lot of heat from the Maple Leafs fanbase, particularly since that abomination we call the Marner contract.

Babcock refuses to coach this team based on who he actually has and what their strengths are. He's far too rigid and stubborn.
Dubas has made a few mistakes, no question, but Babcock is easily the bigger issue.

 

[Dr Pepper]

They can fire Babcock but their goose is still cooked. Dubas overpayed his RFAs, and as a result they have a crap bottom 6 and crap D.No quick fixes for that. Reality is their "window" was last year when their guys were still on ELC

Freddy Andersson being exposed too, this guy is really overrated. Very inconsistent and has been since Anaheim days.

I say Andersen's their MVP right now. If he falters or gets hurt, it'll end their season.

As such, he's more valuable than any other player on that roster right now and that's saying a lot considering the contracts they've got up front.

 

[Dr Pepper]

I think it’s funny he gets blamed for Dubas not giving him an NHL backup. Leafs fans act like if Andersen started the 2nd game sometimes anything would be different with their record in back to backs.

Well this past weekend was a poor example as both the Bruins and Pens are strong teams.

But if the schedule calls for, say, LA the first night and Tampa the second, I'll bet dollars to donuts Babcock would still throw Andersen out for that LA game.

I mean I get that you can't pamper your players, but for a rookie goalie why would you intentionally throw him to the wolves like that? He knew early last week that Kaskisuo would get one of the two games, why would you not give him the home debut with a rested team in front of him?

Babcock's stubborn ways should take a huge chunk of the blame for the lacklustre effort.

 

[Advanced stats]

Toronto has a collection of what could be 5+ all-star players and Babcock can't get it done. That's why he deserves to go.

 

[biotk]

I'm talking about this season. Every single back to back, the Pens have played Jarry on the second game of the back to back.

You said "most, if not all coaches, do" when one coach did last year - Babcock.

While it is true that the Pens have played Jarry on all 4 back-to-backs this season, it is not the case that most, if not all coaches, do - in fact despite it being early in the season, already Pittsburgh is the only team in their division to do so.

Also, when did Murray get the second game last year? Keep in mind he got off to a poor start and actually lost the starting job to DeSmith briefly. So there was a stretch where Murray WAS the backup.

None of the 5 times were early in the season. Good coaches don't play struggling goalies in the second of back-t0-backs.

LA - December 15th
Toronto - February 2nd
Montreal - March 2nd
Boston - March 10th
Philly - March 17th

 

[TheBloodyNine]

Toronto has a collection of what could be 5+ all-star players and Babcock can't get it done. That's why he deserves to go.

Yet none of those potential all stars come from the defense or goaltending. Maybe that's the issue?

 

[abo9]

could it be that since he spent so many years coaching Detroit, he developed a coaching style that was very specific to that team and it just does not work well with the strenghts and weaknesses in Toronto?

Toronto should have a better record and everyone knows it. I'm not talking cup contenders, but at least they should be playoff-bounds without questions.

 

[Advanced stats]

Yet none of those potential all stars come from the defense or goaltending. Maybe that's the issue?

Morgan Rielly(5th in Norris voting, 72? points) Fredrick Andersen (5th in vezina voting, bails the team out) come to mind??

 

[ijuka]

Either Babcock needs to change his coaching style to better suit the players or Dubas needs to be aware of his coaches strengths and weakness' and build his team to suit that. You can't be building a pure skill team and have a coach who wants to win 2-1 every game and won't change.

The problem there is that Dubas wants to build his team his way, but Mike Babcock won't coach it the way he wants. However, when Dubas tried to fire Babcock, Shanahan blocked it and didn't let him. As such, while Babcock can't coach the way Dubas wants his team to be coached, he also cannot fix the issue because the people higher up won't let him get a coach suitable for the way his team is built.

The most significant person to blame for that is Brandan Shanahan, because if he wanted Babcock to coach the team, he should have hired a GM that'd build his team to look like Shanahan's. I'd say what it came down to is they didn't want Dubas to go to another team, but in process they made the team's hierarchy completely perverted and that's on Shanahan.

 

[koyvoo]

Morgan Rielly and Fredrick Andersen come to mind?

Rielly is an offensive star just the same bi do think he was good defensively last season but he’s been a trainwreck in his own end this season. Freddy is good and often saves the teams bacon for sure.

I do agree that Babcock has to go but he was given an unbalanced lineup by his GM. They already had a 70 pt offensive PP QB on defense last season. They gave up a ton of shots and scoring chances last season. Dubas sees these two facts and decided that Tyson Barrie was a need? That’s a brain dead decision and would suggest a poor understanding of this sport in general.