2020-2021 Toronto Maple Leafs General Discussion

[Bender]

The only thing wrong is we paid kids
top dollar for potential. Remember they are only 22.  Most players hit their stride and complete game at 24 to 28.   The whole league is overpaying for potential.   It all started with Edmonton paying all of the 1 St round piccks
that they acquired.   Put a true power forward with these guys and watch out.

And yet everyone criticized Dubas for not paying for potential in Marner and hit cap hit came in even higher after Year 3. You can't have it both ways - you have to bet either way and you either win or you don't. I'm not saying Dubas didn't make any mistakes in the Big 3 negotiations, but you're making it seem like players have no leverage. They absolutely do when they're stars or projected to be stars because that level of talent is in very short supply.

[Bender]

Next year is year 5 after the tank. Patience has run out in Leafland. I havent goven uo on Dubas yet. I rhonk hes a smart guy and will straighten the team out.

Leaving aside the fact that moves made to satisfy impatient fans are almost certainly going to be bad ones there's just an inescapable reality here that impatience doesn't impact.

They're not good enough. Their prospect base is terrible. The "tank" was never really embraced because the only year where they actually shed assets to be bad didn't see them do it fully which means they never grew the sort of depth they needed. Look at Ottawa's collection of picks this year for an example of how these things realistically need to be done.

Impatience in Leafland doomed the team to irrelevance for 25 years. It'd be a real shame if more of it derailed the only promising start the Leafs have had in that time.

I agree with you here. And I believe you criticized the move for Freddy Andersen at the time also. They overshot what they were in 16-17 and instead of unloading the final pieces in Bozak/JVR who were 100% walking anyway and maybe not bringing up the kids for that year they would miss the playoffs one more year and draft high and have extra pieces to work with. Instead asset management has been absolutely abysmal and they simply aren't getting value on trades, UFAs, RFAs or the draft save for a couple of shrewd picks with Robertson & Sandin. The fact that they signed Marleau was an absolute disaster, especially seeing as they are now drafting 13th - 3 spots away from it being it being protected while losing a qualifier. It can't get much worse than that unless you go back to the Kessel trade.

The Lou and Dubas eras have been awful thus far beyond hitting on our high draft picks.

[Nik]

I still don't really see how the Leafs "paid for potential". That implies paying guys for something you think they might be able to do in the future. Giving a player a big contract after a 94 point or 37 goal(in 68 games) season isn't paying them for the player you hope they may be, it's paying them for the player they already are.

There's a fair bit wrong with the Leafs but Marner/Matthews/Nylander not playing up to their contracts is not one of those things. Even if you want to make the case that it is to an extent for Marner, who scored at a 93 point pace this year, it is by at most a couple of million dollars which is not the difference between this team and a championship favourite.

[Nik]

I agree with you here. And I believe you criticized the move for Freddy Andersen at the time also.

It's not even that I criticized the trade at the time(I did, although for somewhat different reasons), it's more what I said even after that first year where the team made the playoffs. Here's part of what I wrote:

And after all of the fun of the playoff chase and the playoffs, now we're left with the genuinely difficult question. How do we take what was, to be perfectly blunt, an at times overwhelmed looking defence and turn them into a championship unit. We're already discussing how the free agent market looks bad. The trade market might be worse. The Leafs are probably going to be picking 18th. There really aren't any great avenues.

A few years later and, even after adding Tavares, we're still faced with the same question.

This isn't to say "I told you so" either. I don't think seeing that made me particularly smart. Rebuilds take time and they're not just about landing a star or two. It's about a broad base. It's about finding diamonds in the rough. The Leafs basically put their rebuild on the credit card after landing Matthews and now it's pay-up time.

[Frank E]

They're also in a much tighter cap scenario than they were in 2017.

[Nik]

They're also in a much tighter cap scenario than they were in 2017.

Sure but I don't think that changes the equation much. Teams don't solve huge problems via free agency.

[herman]

https://www.sportsnet.ca/hockey/nhl/31-thoughts-will-dubas-handle-maple-leafs-off-season/
Leafs get the spotlight on this one

If the Maple Leafs believe this group needs a change, do they also believe their style needs a change? There are whispers Dubas considered some things around the trade deadline that, as one executive said, fans and media “wouldn’t have expected” from him. One of those was Kyle Clifford, who he knows well. But I think there were more.

I can’t see him entirely changing his belief that Toronto should play a certain way, but I can see him modifying it. Someone else with some bite is coming, and I’d guess it’s on the blue line.

and the first 5 thoughts

Friedman on the 31 thoughts podcast:

"After the Leafs were knocked out, on Monday I heard some stuff about Marner's name being out there. But one thing I've learned is that what's out there is not always the reality...

— birky (@b1rky) August 13, 2020

In case you want to know but don't care to listen to the podcast

[herman]

https://mapleleafshotstove.com/2020/08/13/kyle-dubas-springs-to-mitch-marners-defense-defends-10-9-million-contract/
I'm giving Marner the benefit of the doubt for this season. High ankle sprain, plus adjusting to additional attention from teams, etc. He still put up pro-rated 90+ pts playing like almost-ass to my eye. He does need to dump his camp if possible though, especially whoever is telling him he needs to shoot more selfishly. And play the puck in tighter to the body so he doesn't get stymied so easily on the build up after drawing in the first check. Mitch's magic comes from drawing in extra coverage and threading the puck to open targets.

[Bender]

https://mapleleafshotstove.com/2020/08/13/kyle-dubas-springs-to-mitch-marners-defense-defends-10-9-million-contract/
I'm giving Marner the benefit of the doubt for this season. High ankle sprain, plus adjusting to additional attention from teams, etc. He still put up pro-rated 90+ pts playing like almost-ass to my eye. He does need to dump his camp if possible though, especially whoever is telling him he needs to shoot more selfishly. And play the puck in tighter to the body so he doesn't get stymied so easily on the build up after drawing in the first check. Mitch's magic comes from drawing in extra coverage and threading the puck to open targets.

Unless he puts on 20lbs of upper body strength and works with Dan Belfry on his shot day in day out, he absolutely does not need to shoot more.

[Stebro]

Am I the only one who thinks there's a cultural issue here? Marner has mentioned the work ethic and effort more than once. Matthews say things like "we just kind of quit" or "we don't care where other think we are". To me the real leaders are Rielly, Muzzin and Hyman. I don't care how talented Matthews, Marner and Nylander are, im sick of quotes such as "we need to learn from this, we have to work harder next season" . Rielly, Hyman and Andersen need new contracts soon, we don't have the time to be nice.

[Guilt Trip]

Am I the only one who thinks there's a cultural issue here? Marner has mentioned the work ethic and effort more than once. Matthews say things like "we just kind of quit" or "we don't care where other think we are". To me the real leaders are Rielly, Muzzin and Hyman. I don't care how talented Matthews, Marner abd Nylander are, im sick of quotes such as "we need to learn from this, we have to work harder next season" . Rielly, Hyman and Andersen need new contracts soon, we don't have the time to be nice.

I don't see a cultural issue. I've heard every player say we need to work harder and other "lines". Truth of it is, they need to work harder because they didn't get it done. I have zero issue with Matthews saying earlier this year that we kind of just quit. It was a truthful statement. As for the we don't care outside of this room what people think, I don't have an issue with that either. You can't listen to the media, the fans or other outside influences. He also said he believes that management will do the right thing. As for new contracts, Hyman and Freddie. We'll see how both do next year whenever that happens. Leafs may not want to sign either and with the expansion draft coming it could make it interesting. Rielly still has 2 full seasons left.

[RedLeaf]

How many of the Leafs problems can we blame on how they showed in the qualifying round against the stifling defence of the Blue Jackets and the way the Jackets seem to discombobulate the offence of their opponents ?

I mean would we all be zeroing in on everything wrong with the Leafs had they played and beat another team and advanced to the 1st round?

I’m fairly confident the Leafs are a better club than many of the remaining teams .

[Frank E]

They're also in a much tighter cap scenario than they were in 2017.

Sure but I don't think that changes the equation much. Teams don't solve huge problems via free agency.

Huge problems?

The cap situation complicates any trades, which is more what I was referring to.  Dubas has to trade out as much cap space as he's receiving.  This is going to be difficult with the unexpected fixed cap the teams have to adhere to.

[Nik]

Huge problems?

Yeah, I'd say that going from a middle of the pack team to a top tier contender without a good prospect base qualifies.

The cap situation complicates any trades, which is more what I was referring to.  Dubas has to trade out as much cap space as he's receiving.  This is going to be difficult with the unexpected fixed cap the teams have to adhere to.

Sure, but trades are overwhelmingly likely to be either a zero-sum game talent wise or they're future mortgaging, neither of which really helps the Leafs even if they have space.

[Nik]

Am I the only one who thinks there's a cultural issue here? Marner has mentioned the work ethic and effort more than once. Matthews say things like "we just kind of quit" or "we don't care where other think we are". To me the real leaders are Rielly, Muzzin and Hyman. I don't care how talented Matthews, Marner abd Nylander are, im sick of quotes such as "we need to learn from this, we have to work harder next season" . Rielly, Hyman and Andersen need new contracts soon, we don't have the time to be nice.

That's just what hockey players say when they lose. I don't think you're going to find a bunch of players who get eliminated who say "Yeah, the other team is just better than us. No matter how hard we work, they're just at another level than we are".