GDT: Around the League - 2021/22 PART III

[Stephen]

He would have required waivers last year if he didn't crack the Leafs, so you could say that there was a little bit of motivation in that sense. The Leafs are also a team that doesn't exactly like to stop guys who don't have a future here from getting opportunities elsewhere. It is a big reason why they can attract good prospect UFA's with upside every year.

Does Marchment crack the Leafs last year? They likely wanted to give Vesey and Thornton a chance regardless, and given the way Marchment played last year, they probably still acquire guys like Galchenyuk and Foligno. That is on top of Kerfoot, Mikheyev, and Engvall all being here already too.

The thing is, a lot of this is hindsight. There are probabilities of success on every move. You don't stop making good, smart moves with a good probability of success just because they did not work out. What if this became another McKegg-Hyman for us? There were better chances of that than Marchment being a PPG player 2 years after he was a mediocre AHLer for many years on the Marlies. Are we suddenly not going to make more trades like McKegg-Hyman because there is a chance that the McKegg works out well for the other team and the Hyman doesn't work out for us? That is what happened this time, and that is assuming Malgin amounts to nothing.

It was a great move for the Leafs, and one they should never think twice about making if given the chance to do so again.

Mistakes happen all the time in player development, and I've been saying Marchment is our payback for the Hyman win all those years ago so like you say, sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't...

But what annoys me about this particular trade is we actually spent a number of years developing Marchment, didn't have much of this body type in the organization and figured it was a nothing burger at a time when Toronto seemed to be getting smaller and more skilled by design. Nic Petan and Michael Carcone were other projects at the time we acquired. And we already had guys like Johnsson breaking though and younger versions of Marner and Nylander. It was just a weird fit, weird project and in the end we didn't even give Malgin much of a chance.

Personnel churn happens in development andacap world and we've done pretty well over the years but this one was poor by design.

 

[DraftSchmaft]

Florida sure knows how to get most out of their players. I'd be curious to see if Dermott can become a no.4 there.

I'm not sold on Keefe at all. Even Boston made Ritchie a fan favorite at some point and we literally get nothing from him.

 

[kb]

Florida sure knows how to get most out of their players. I'd be curious to see if Dermott can become a no.4 there.

I'm not sold on Keefe at all. Even Boston made Ritchie a fan favorite at some point and we literally get nothing from him.

The team he coaches is missing arguably their best all round D man, and they are 10-2-1 in their last 13, and 26-6-2 in their past 34.

You don't trust his results in a results based business.

 

[SeaOfBlue]

Florida sure knows how to get most out of their players. I'd be curious to see if Dermott can become a no.4 there.

I'm not sold on Keefe at all. Even Boston made Ritchie a fan favorite at some point and we literally get nothing from him.

Point out the two guys who are not really working well under Keefe, but ignore the many more guys who have worked out extremely well under Keefe.

Dermott is the main mystery to me. He worked well with Keefe at the AHL level, but worked better with Babcock in the NHL. May just be a confidence thing, and I think he could be a #4 in a lot of places if he regains that confidence, but between Sandin/Liljegren vying for opportunities and having higher upside, and a top 4 that is tough to crack right now, IDK if he really has a spot with us anymore unfortunately.

Ritchie just seems like he won't work outside of our 4th line and maybe Tavares/Nylander. Florida has more room for guys like Ritchie with how they play. It also doesn't help when Engvall, Mikheyev, Kerfoot, and Bunting have all looked really good when healthy, and Ritchie doesn't play anything but LW.

Also should keep in mind that Florida couldn't get anything out of Michael Matheson, Brett Connolly (had to cap dump him), Henrik Borgstrom (used him and Riley Stillman to dump Connolly), Anton Stralman (had to pay 2 2nd's to cap dump him), and have 6.5 mill in dead cap next year from Yandle and Darling buyouts. They are not getting much out of Tippett or Denisenko right now either, considering where they were drafted, but it is still too early to write them off. They have less than 5 mill in cap next year and while they have most of their key guys locked up, they have a lot of depth spots (including Marchment) they need to re-sign or replace. That includes being fine with running a defense that has been far more iffy than ours this year.

 

[geo25]

Florida sure knows how to get most out of their players. I'd be curious to see if Dermott can become a no.4 there.

I'm not sold on Keefe at all. Even Boston made Ritchie a fan favorite at some point and we literally get nothing from him.

Like you, I'm not convinced Keefe is experienced or savvy enough to lead this team. Regardless of their season success he has proven (and will again, I regret to state) he is incapable of leading this team in the playoffs. Come spring I hope he is the first to go...

 

[The Podium]

Florida sure knows how to get most out of their players. I'd be curious to see if Dermott can become a no.4 there.

I'm not sold on Keefe at all. Even Boston made Ritchie a fan favorite at some point and we literally get nothing from him.

Ritchie wasn’t a fan favorite in Boston… in fact he was the whipping boy there. Up until this season I was roommates with maybe the biggest Bruins fan in the country, so I watched my fair share of Bruins games.

He was there what he is now, the only difference is he played net front on the PP with the perfection line and was able to pick up a few greasy goals.

 

[Dekes For Days]

Marchment may or may not have had a path to full time promotion here in Toronto at that moment in 2019 but it was a bit of an unforced error in the sense Toronto didn't need to do anything with him.

We traded him in 2020, not 2019. We were hitting a lot of injuries that year and it was good to have NHL-quality depth, like Malgin, in our back pocket. We likely would have lost Marchment to either waivers at the start of last season, or UFA last offseason, so yeah, we kind of did need to do something with him or he was gone for no return anyway.

Toronto seemed to be getting smaller and more skilled by design. Nic Petan and Michael Carcone were other projects at the time we acquired.

Except we weren't getting "smaller by design".

You love to point to Petan, but ignore that the guy we traded for Petan wasn't big or tough either, and he was a liability on the ice and a pending UFA.
You love to point to Carcone, but ignore that the guy we traded for him was a mediocre 4th liner 1 year out from UFA, who required waivers and had requested a trade, and Carcone was later included in a trade where we got back 6'6", 220+ lbs Ben Harpur.

During that same season we acquired Carcone/Petan, we acquired bigger guys in Gagne and Baptiste, and this guy you may have heard of called Muzzin.

You love to point to Malgin, but ignore that literally 2 weeks prior, we had traded a smaller guy away in the trade that brought us Clifford.

Fun fact: Malgin had a higher hit rate on our team than Marchment.

this one was poor by design.

What it actually was was a pretty smart move that made a lot of sense.

 

[TheGoldenJet]

I wouldn't be surprised if you traded Ritchie for Marchment right now, there would be very little difference in the roster quality on either team; Marchment would effectively be a waiver fodder 13th forward here, and Ritchie would likely turn into a guy who looks fitting for a 10th overall pick.

I agree with a lot of your posts Blue, but I don’t ever see the bolded happening, as Ritchie is simply not as good as the current version of Marchment.

I think we have to chalk this deal up as just another bad trade by Dubas. The Malgins and the Petans really blow up Dubas’ spreadsheets, but they just don’t cut it in this league when push comes to shove.

 

[TheGoldenJet]

Feel free to read through the first few pages of the these threads
Confirmed with Link: - [TOR/FLA] Denis Malgin for Mason Marchment
Confirmed Trade: - [TOR/FLA] Denis Malgin for Mason Marchment
Confirmed with Link: - Malgin to Toronto for LW Mason Marchment

While most didn't see Malgin as anything too special, 99% of the posters saw Marchment as less. He was a career AHLer who had skating issues and was not projecting upward
It kind of honestly was an open-shut case of a nothing trade, and I don't see anyone adamant it was a bad deal, even those who did like Marchment or didn't like Malgin's size in comparison.

Great for Marchment to prove everyone wrong so far this season, and it would be nice to have him right now, but this current run he's on (sustainable or otherwise) was not really in the cards for anyone to predict

We must hold NHL GMs to a higher standard than HFboards posters.

PS I never praised this trade, wouldn’t have done it at the time, yet blunder boy did.

 

[ULF_55]

List of players with eight or more points in an NHL game - Wikipedia

6 point night?

They should trade him while he's hot!

 

[justashadowof]

If the Leafs traded for Shattenkirk from Anaheim, he would have the opportunity to play 89 regular season games in the 2021-22 season.

Nobody would have predicted that Marchment would have over a point per game in 21 games at any point of his NHL career but the trade did seem like a classic fleecing of using a marginal waterbug to acquire a rarer type of forward.

 

[PromisedLand]

Florida sure knows how to get most out of their players. I'd be curious to see if Dermott can become a no.4 there.

I'm not sold on Keefe at all. Even Boston made Ritchie a fan favorite at some point and we literally get nothing from him.

Keefe can easily get outcoached by a seasoned coach or when things get tough. Examples we have seen are CBJ and MTL series.

Even Bylsma had regular season success with prime Malkin and Crosby; heck that dude even won a cup. It doesn't mean Bylsma is some magic coach.

Keefe seems to have learned a bit I guess based on how he has gone about this season. We will see in the playoffs whether Keefe can actually use last change to his advantage instead of running his mouth "we don't care about line matching" bullshit he said before the habs series; or if we can devise a tactic to tackle opposition in the playoffs.

I am gonna be so f***ing pissed if dubas fans yell "hot goalie" again! For all the so called "hot goalies" we faced against CBJ and Habs not once did we screen the goalie; looked for garbage goals/rebounds or crash the net. I would hope that as a coach you would tell your players that if "fancy" plays is not getting you a goal then crash the f***ing net. Find a different way to score

 

[DraftSchmaft]

The team he coaches is missing arguably their best all round D man, and they are 10-2-1 in their last 13, and 26-6-2 in their past 34.

You don't trust his results in a results based business.

I trust the results because the team is good. I don't think the results are coupled with Keefe. Perhaps there exists a coach that will get "optimal" results even better than his. Be it standings, playoffs, or even just getting more gas out of individual players etc.

 

[uncleben]

We must hold NHL GMs to a higher standard than HFboards posters.

PS I never praised this trade, wouldn’t have done it at the time, yet blunder boy did.

Well of course we should, but that's not what I was saying. Just that it wasn't really seen as a big deal by most anyone here.


And hey, if you had the foresight to hold onto the older, sub-PPG AHL player for the younger, established NHL player, good on you! It would've paid off so far

 

[uncleben]

Mistakes happen all the time in player development, and I've been saying Marchment is our payback for the Hyman win all those years ago so like you say, sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't...

But what annoys me about this particular trade is we actually spent a number of years developing Marchment, didn't have much of this body type in the organization and figured it was a nothing burger at a time when Toronto seemed to be getting smaller and more skilled by design. Nic Petan and Michael Carcone were other projects at the time we acquired. And we already had guys like Johnsson breaking though and younger versions of Marner and Nylander. It was just a weird fit, weird project and in the end we didn't even give Malgin much of a chance.

Personnel churn happens in development andacap world and we've done pretty well over the years but this one was poor by design.

To some credit, we did give Malgin a chance and signed him last year, but he wanted to go closer to home last year for better COVID security. And this year, we tried to re-sign him yet again and give him a shot at the roster this year, but wanted to stay in SUI to get more ice time to develop - and to his credit, that seems to be paying off.

Early reports on the season were that Toronto would try to lure him back again after the Swiss League is over for a contract next year.

I still don't think he'll be a big shock on the roster, but it'd be a nice story if he can develop in Switzerland and come in as an older more mature player and put up points.

 

[Menzinger]

Marchment is a fun story this season for the guy. But if anyone things his current production, with his 114% pdo is anywhere remotely sustainable, I've got some magical beans for sale that may be of interest.

 

[zeke]

Can't believe those dumb Panthers didn't extend him already.

Now they can't even afford him because cap hell!

 

[The Podium]

Marchment is a fun story this season for the guy. But if anyone things his current production, with his 114% pdo is anywhere remotely sustainable, I've got some magical beans for sale that may be of interest.

He’s also has 12 point in 3 games so even his PPG pace is a bit disingenuous

 

[X66]

I can see how other fans love this stuff since they're trolls, but Leafs fans gotta give obsessing over former players the way many of you do lol.

There's a long list of players on every team that the former team would be better if they kept.

Look at the Leafs alone...

Tavares, Campbell, Muzzin, Brodie, Bunting, Kase, Hyman(when he was here), Spezza...

 

[BertCorbeau]

I can see how other fans love this stuff since they're trolls, but Leafs fans gotta give obsessing over former players the way many of you do lol.

There's a long list of players on every team that the former team would be better if they kept.

Look at the Leafs alone...

Tavares, Campbell, Muzzin, Brodie, Bunting, Kase, Hyman(when he was here), Spezza...

The Blackhawks gave up on Holl

 

[ACC1224]

The Blackhawks gave up on Holl

Looks like they made a good call there.

 

[Machinae]

All we can do is hope Malgin comes over next year and makes an impact in a Kerfoot or Kase role.

Fwiw I think both players are gone due to cap.

Kerfoot 3.5 mil will likely be moved and get a fair return this offseason after a good run here.

Kase will leave as a free agent. Yes, he's technically an RFA. However, he has arbitration rights, and the Leafs can't risk him getting 3-4 mil awarded to him and being stuck unable to walk away from his contract. He won't be qualified..

Malgin has had a lot of good development in the Swiss league and is one of the better players outside the NHL. If the Leafs did not hold his rights I would assume he would be this years big euro free agent.

 

[stickty111]

Pretty much

 

[fahad203]

Keefe can easily get outcoached by a seasoned coach or when things get tough. Examples we have seen are CBJ and MTL series.

Even Bylsma had regular season success with prime Malkin and Crosby; heck that dude even won a cup. It doesn't mean Bylsma is some magic coach.

Keefe seems to have learned a bit I guess based on how he has gone about this season. We will see in the playoffs whether Keefe can actually use last change to his advantage instead of running his mouth "we don't care about line matching" bullshit he said before the habs series; or if we can devise a tactic to tackle opposition in the playoffs.

I am gonna be so f***ing pissed if dubas fans yell "hot goalie" again! For all the so called "hot goalies" we faced against CBJ and Habs not once did we screen the goalie; looked for garbage goals/rebounds or crash the net. I would hope that as a coach you would tell your players that if "fancy" plays is not getting you a goal then crash the f***ing net. Find a different way to score

Even now I am not sold on this team. Keefe seemed to have been doing better but we also owned North division last year, only to be outclassed and out coached in every manner

This team in 7 game series against any fast heavy team like Tampa, Florda, Rangers would get rag dolled. Against Carolina our D would get outworked and so will our forwards
That is if we get good goaltending. Which is 50/50 it seems at this stage. Night in night out I don't know which goalie I am going to get. The vezina candidate in Campbell or the back up Campbell

Keefe seems to be learning on the job. Even Dallas Eakins has come around. After like 8 years in NHL. The Leafs are not the Mcdonalds of NHL where you get your first work, then build your skills and experience

 

[LaPlante94]

Where does Marchment play? Over Kerfoot, Bunting, Engvall, Mikheyev? Over Simmonds as a barely playing 4th liner? It was not going to happen. He is not better than any of them, and I could care less about his little bender with Florida. A lot of guys have gone on benders there. In terms of what he brings to the table here, he is no different than Ritchie... Except Ritchie at least had a proven track record in the NHL.

Marchment is also 1.5 years older than Malgin. Considering 1.5 years ago, Marchment was a career AHLer, I would say that is fairly significant.

My apologies about the age difference. Got the birthdays mixed up and thought I saw 96 as his birthdate and not 97. Was past my bedtime. 1.5 years is still not that big of a difference and Marchment easily fits into a 4th line role here. Saves us 2.5 mil too because signing Ritchie probably doesn't happen then.