Athletic: Dubas Job on the Line this Season (contract expiring after this season)

[HolyCrap]

I don't agree with those posters, but that's pretty soft.

What’s soft?

 

[Tufted Titmouse]

What’s soft?

Putting them all on ignore. I have a few people on ignore but it's not because I disagree with an opinion they have.

 

[4thline]

TL;DR: Dubas deserves another 10 games to see what happens and if they pull out of the funk, and if he is fired, I get it, and the team is setup almost perfectly for a new GM to change everything as they see fit with our abundance of cap space after next season

20-30 for me, with no major moves (I'd like to see the 3C spot filled with one of Kerf/Engvall out, but that's it. Let the chips fall where they may. If this group can't play itself into a playoff spot Kyle's out, one of M&M with him. Firesale any UFA that won't lock into one of the "security" type team friendly long-term extensions (I'm looking at you Bunting)

 

[All Mod Cons]

I still maintain at least 15 games need to be allowed before a massive move like this is justified. They gave Babcock 20 games and we knew he should be fired end of game 7 the year before. I personally have been a Dubas supporter his time here. Even if I disagreed sometimes I could understand WHY he was making the move. He wasn't going out there and offering Gudbranson 4x4 for example. It was a nice change from our past GM's who did just that.

But with all of that said, it is time for the Leafs to realize that while these games are meaningless (I suspect this is why their effort has been so poor, they know even if they won people don't care right now) we need to make the playoffs to prove people wrong and we are not in a good division to half ass that.

Before the season our management said the goal is to win the division, win the presidents trophy, and then the cup. So far the players are not on the same page. So if they keep playing like this, then yeah it sucks to say but we need a GM to come in and have time to evaluate things in season so next offseason they are prepared to get Matthews dealt with and then address the team as they see.

One thing even the biggest haters need to be thankful for with Dubas is he has this team setup really well. They have all their future firsts, some nice young players in Robertson, Knies, Sandin, and Liljegren in no order. You have stars in their primes. You have no real cap commitment past next season, so the GM is free to shape the roster as they wish with total freedom from the cap. And our scouting and development side has been excellent under Dubas and those systems are in place already so they don't need to try and re-invent the wheel in many parts of the Org that operate efficiently.

I suspect the natural reaction is to fire Dubas and bring in a GM who is older and experienced. They will do what NYR did and acquire and overpay a bunch of tough depth guys in one offseason to try and change the stereotype they were soft. How this goes is anyones guess. Mine is poorly, as it usually goes when you acquire bad players for toughness. I'd be impressed if they were able to acquire heavy players who could also play.

TL;DR: Dubas deserves another 10 games to see what happens and if they pull out of the funk, and if he is fired, I get it, and the team is setup almost perfectly for a new GM to change everything as they see fit with our abundance of cap space after next season

I disagree that our scouting and development has been excellent.

 

[supermann_98]

In this case, it does.

Hard to argue with the local Dubas defense attorney. Unless you want to type a novel and waste hours of your life doing so I wouldn’t even bother arguing. Dubas is infallible in their eyes and is the smartest hockey person in the NHL, if not the history of the NHL

 

[HolyCrap]

Putting them all on ignore. I have a few people on ignore but it's not because I disagree with an opinion they have.

That’s not why I have them on ignore. Pretty dumb of you to assume that. Those posters are trolls and do nothing but argue just to hear themselves argue. They fill pages of constant crap and bicker with anyone they can engage with. They are not worth even seeing on here.

 

[Tufted Titmouse]

I disagree that our scouting and development has been excellent.

We've gotten pretty good value out of the Sandin, Knies, Robertson and Niemela picks, although I am starting to worry about Niemela. The other 3 are great value, though.

 

[Future]

That Kadri trade and Tavares signing are moves that will haunt this franchise for years to come.

If Matthews leaves I don’t know what I’ll do as a fan.

 

[All Mod Cons]

We've gotten pretty good value out of the Sandin, Knies, Robertson and Niemela picks, although I am starting to worry about Niemela. The other 3 are great value, though.

I don't think it's been excellent. Always hyped at the time, but then they start to falter.

Robertson is maybe promising. But we have to remember he has 4 goals in 24 games. 2 in 1 game. Let's see how he actually does in the long run.

Sandin looks to be a 3rd pairing defenseman, hopefully he'll improve.

Knies is the new hype but hasn't played against professionals, so we don't know, but let's just say he's the real gem here.

About 12 months ago everyone was excited about Abruzzese, Abramov, Kokkonen, SDA, Hollowell and Kral, but do they look like they'll make the NHL full time and be impactful?

What about the hype around Hirvonen and especially Miettinen? You don't hear anything about Miettinen any more.

With the exception of Knies, 90% of the other prospects are the exact same player. Small, undersized forwards that are either Finnish or had a late birthday.

If they were neither of these (or small puck moving defensemen) we were not interested at the draft table.

Unfortunately there are some big bodied guys who can play hockey coming out of the draft every year.

 

[Tufted Titmouse]

With the exception of Knies, 90% of the other prospects are the exact same player. Small, undersized forwards that are either Finnish or had a late birthday.

3/5 of our picks last year are over 6'.

2/3 picks in 2021 were over 6'.

5/12 picks in 2020 were over 6', and 5/12 were listed at 5'11''.

I am frustrated we didn't take Schnieder or Guhle - they were obvious fits and filled exactly what our org lacked. Minten and Knies are both big boys, I would say they are much more of the core group over the Abramov's and the Mettinens.

 

[Stephen]

Murray is pretty cheap fix with buyout, so I don't think that is something that will slow down anyone. Muzzin has turned into bad contract, but might be at LTIR after this season. This club is still very easy to turn around and retool if we choose to go to that direction.

A Murray buyout would still be a problem for a team running on $4 in cap space to start the season and needing to re-sign Samsonov and add another competent goalie.

 

[Stephen]

We've gotten pretty good value out of the Sandin, Knies, Robertson and Niemela picks, although I am starting to worry about Niemela. The other 3 are great value, though.

These players are obviously representative of our next wave and we need them to pan out but keep in mind none of them have given us any more service than a Travis Dermott or an Andreas Johnsson so we can’t really declare them a success.

 

[All Mod Cons]

3/5 of our picks last year are over 6'.

2/3 picks in 2021 were over 6'.

5/12 picks in 2020 were over 6', and 5/12 were listed at 5'11''.

I am frustrated we didn't take Schnieder or Guhle - they were obvious fits and filled exactly what our org lacked. Minten and Knies are both big boys, I would say they are much more of the core group over the Abramov's and the Mettinens.

It's not literally about height though is it really? Like no one would call Engvall small.

But he's small.

Maybe I should've said soft.

But the point stands. Remember when everyone was excited about Abruzzese joining the team. And SDA, Miettinen, Abramov, Hirvonen, Niemela, Kokkonen, even Brazeau.

Excellent drafting (and scouting) and yet where are any of these guys? There was so much bype around Timashov remember? Like legit excitement.

Not many pan out. I personally don't think we've drafted excellently.

 

[Tufted Titmouse]

Not many pan out. I personally don't think we've drafted excellently.

Compared to who? Not a lot of teams in their contending window have great farms for obvious reasons.

You can't really comapre us to teams like Montreal or Ottawa, which have had 6-8 picks in the first 2 rounds for the last little while.

I'm done with Dubas, but I disagree with negativity around our current drafting and development. I think it's done well without much capital. We've had to trade a few young guys as well who are doing well on other teams.

Contract management and roster construction are the two big knocks against the current regime imo.

 

[HockeyVirus]

I disagree that our scouting and development has been excellent.

Seeing as we haven't had first round picks, and the one we did got brain cancer so not really fair to count that, is there another team with as much success with late firsts (Sandin, Liljegren) and 2nd rounds as us?

 

[Menzinger]

A Murray buyout would still be a problem for a team running on $4 in cap space to start the season and needing to re-sign Samsonov and add another competent goalie.

Wouldn't be good but in the grand scheme of things it's actually fairly minimal. Less than 700k cap hit next season 2 million the season after in terms of penalty (when the team has a bunch of salary opening up)

 

[Menzinger]

It's not literally about height though is it really? Like no one would call Engvall small.

But he's small.

Maybe I should've said soft.

But the point stands. Remember when everyone was excited about Abruzzese joining the team. And SDA, Miettinen, Abramov, Hirvonen, Niemela, Kokkonen, even Brazeau.

Excellent drafting (and scouting) and yet where are any of these guys? There was so much bype around Timashov remember? Like legit excitement.

Not many pan out. I personally don't think we've drafted excellently.

To be fair, most of those guys you've mentioned are mid round picks taken in the last 3ish seasons. Guys taken in that range tend to take longer before being nhl ready. But by all metrics guys like Hirvonen, Niemela ect are tracking very well.

 

[andora]

Seeing as we haven't had first round picks, and the one we did got brain cancer so not really fair to count that, is there another team with as much success with late firsts (Sandin, Liljegren) and 2nd rounds as us?

What would the criteria be players to have made the nhl?

 

[4thline]

The first thing that becomes abundantly clear when drafting an development comes up is that there are fans that understand the process and timelines, those that closely follow our system, those that do both, and those that do neither.

Of the 5 drafts that Dubas has overseen only two are remotely close to being ready to evaluate.

The one that is closer yielded 2x NHL defenseman (both still with top 4 upside, and still has 2x jury out trending up that could make it (Holmberg and Kral), excepting any late bloomers. Drafting late 1st 2x NHLers is a solid good/par result. If anyone else becomes a regular thats a great result

2019 is still a couple years early to really have a fix on, but having one guy seemingly made it with top 6F upside and 4/5 other picks still in the mix as legitimate prospects (the 2D with more runway than the two F) is a strong sign. With no 1st rounder is arguable that Robertson alone pars it, another moves it to + level

2020-2022 is still in pure projection mode, and we have a lot of guys that have progressed and are performing really really well. Sure there's a handful of extra 6ths and 7ths we can essentially write off, but overall the pool is remarkably healthy.

 

[TorMapleJays]

What would the criteria be players to have made the nhl?

The prerequisite for the nhl is skill level, the prerequisite for the Leafs is Soo GreyHounds

 

[All Mod Cons]

Seeing as we haven't had first round picks, and the one we did got brain cancer so not really fair to count that, is there another team with as much success with late firsts (Sandin, Liljegren) and 2nd rounds as us?

Like in games played? Or just how hyped a prospect is? Or points?

 

[HockeyVirus]

Like in games played? Or just how hyped a prospect is? Or points?

Dubas has only been GM since 2017. Last year his 2017 pick played solid top 4 minutes for us while the other dmen drafted around him all busted. How many players after Sandin have more games? Robertson is 21, Knies 20. So some are ahead of their peers and others are too young to expect anything right away

 

[All Mod Cons]

Dubas has only been GM since 2017. Last year his 2017 pick played solid top 4 minutes for us while the other dmen drafted around him all busted. How many players after Sandin have more games? Robertson is 21, Knies 20. So some are ahead of their peers and others are too young to expect anything right away

So games then?

Romanov, Fehervary??

Is anyone behind their peers?

So like with Amirov (obviously health issues are not anyone's fault and couldn't have been predicted), should we have gone Guhle, Schneider or Mercer? Or is that one always an asterix?

 

[blue stick]

he's in tough

 

[keonsbitterness]

Dubas has only been GM since 2017.

May 2018.