Ilya Mikheyev asked for a trade

[MapleLeafs9]

I will always be reminded of this when I hear his name.

Why do people think about this so much? The puck was like 1 foot in the air, how is that Mikheyev's fault lol

 

[Cynical]

If I'm a player and not one of those top 4 contracts, I know I'm probably just someone who the Leafs will use as capspace fodder. It can't be good being a support player on this team right now with the cap issues. You have zero security.

Ilya showed that he can be a good player. I wouldn't be surprised if he scored more goals after another offseason of recovering from that wrist injury.

 

[diceman934]

Love him. Works hard and his skill set is great. He will play top 6 all year. Be prepared for a breakout season. In fact he will likely price him self off of the Leafs for the following season. Defense is great kills penalties and is a great passer.

 

[Cynical]

Love him. Works hard and his skill set is great. He will play top 6 all year. Be prepared for a breakout season. In fact he will likely price him self off of the Leafs for the following season. Defense is great kills penalties and is a great passer.

I think he already knows the Leafs can't give him his value which is why he's asking for a trade.

 

[HansonBro]

If he isn't slotted in next to Matthews as a Hyman replacement, you have to wonder what the plan was

 

[justashadowof]

Zaitsev - not a top 4 D
Mikhayev - Middle 6 maybe prior to wrist injury, since then...bottom 6
Ozhiganov - Barely 7th D calibre
Lehtonen - Not sure if even NHL calibre
Barabnov - Maybe looked like bottom 6 here but connected in San Jose so maybe we missed out.

Even NCAA is hard to hit home runs on, we hit one of the few home runs with Tyler Bozak but reality is you want top 4 D or top 6 F, you have to draft them.

Panarin is like 1 in a million.

The truth is that the above is probably a decent outcome versus the average result with these undrafted free agents.

As I posted in the training camp thread, I hope the Leafs have their sights on a couple of undrafted 18 year olds from the 2021 draft. I'd bet the farm that there are a substantial number of future NHLers who didn't get drafted in this past draft due to the lack of opportunity to rise in the rankings during a disrupted 2020-21 hockey season.

 

[WTFMAN99]

The truth is that the above is probably a decent outcome versus the average result with these undrafted free agents.

As I posted in the training camp thread, I hope the Leafs have their sights on a couple of undrafted 18 year olds from the 2021 draft. I'd bet the farm that there are a substantial number of future NHLers who didn't get drafted in this past draft due to the lack of opportunity to rise in the rankings during a disrupted 2020-21 hockey season.

Great case and it's a unique set of circumstances because of the pandemic, definitely not the norm.

I agree with this 100%

 

[Racer88]

I guess Dubas will just have to try harder to make Mik happy.

Maybe give him some more money, that seems to be Dubas’s go to move

 

[Racer88]

If he wants out then dump him. He is next to useless anyways

 

[justloveleafs]

I used to do a lot of business with sports agents and nhl players... Did that ever get me any love from posters on any sports boards. It got the opposite effect...

First off, everyone thought i was full of crap... Then the board itself would suspend me or delete posts.

I will say this though, there are a lot of interesting people on this board who are both passionate and able to read the tea leaves...

So I continue to post here and there..

 

[notbias]

What teams have worse lw depth than the leafs? Where exactly does he think he's going to get top 6 minutes and pp time?

Anaheim, Arizona, Buffalo, Columbus, LA, Nashville, NJ, NYI, SJ, Tampa Bay, Washington

Some of these teams have better top-end talent, but probably not better depth, he would likely fit into at least a 3rd line role on these teams, not even sure if that is guaranteed in Toronto.

 

[Leafsfan74]

I will always be reminded of this when I hear his name.

In Cup starved Toronto where fans memories are very long, this could be the defining moment of his career here.

Sports keep people interested for just such moments and "what ifs". If he pots that chance, this Leafs team and the Habs team probably look drastically different heading into this coming season. Bergevin almost certainly would have qualified for CERB.

 

[Beaumaris]

If he wants out then dump him. He is next to useless anyways

Absolute nonsense

 

[shortfuze]

I think he already knows the Leafs can't give him his value which is why he's asking for a trade.

but hes already signed so going to another team wont give him more money. until the off season. toronto is probably one of, if not, his best situation where he can put up as many points as he can so he can get himself a nice payday.

 

[NMacrules]

This gobbler is a selfish twit. Buy him out and get rid of him after everything the leafs did for him during his injury and standing by him.

Requesting a trade from a sub mediocre player is a joke. If he doesnt want to be in Toronto, there's the door asshat.

 

[Menzinger]

Thinking about it more, reads like the agent trying to pressure the Leafs to giving him more opportunities (top 6 as opposed to top 9 usage plus pp) heading into a contract year.

It's up to him to build chemistry though. He wasn't able to.do much of that last season when he played with Nylander and Tavares.

And also up to him to fix that shot accuracy. That's not a usage/team problem. That's on him

 

[ottomaddox]

He's losing the public relations war now...

 

[HansonBro]

I used to do a lot of business with sports agents and nhl players... Did that ever get me any love from posters on any sports boards. It got the opposite effect...

First off, everyone thought i was full of crap... Then the board itself would suspend me or delete posts.

I will say this though, there are a lot of interesting people on this board who are both passionate and able to read the tea leaves...

So I continue to post here and there..

Ok.....

Maybe it was your attitude

 

[ottomaddox]

I used to do a lot of business with sports agents and nhl players... Did that ever get me any love from posters on any sports boards. It got the opposite effect...

First off, everyone thought i was full of crap... Then the board itself would suspend me or delete posts.

I will say this though, there are a lot of interesting people on this board who are both passionate and able to read the tea leaves...

So I continue to post here and there..

I think you're doing OK:

422 Likes and 46 Trophy Points

 

[fahad203]

Micheyev was pacing out to be a 48pt player in his rookie year over an 82 game season. He was up and down the lineup that year, but was given a healthy look on the Tavares line at one point. But lets talk the most recent year, as there was a major injury that occurred in his rookie year that hindered his abilities.

Last year he was 6th on the team in total HDCF all while being tasked with a defensive role.
View attachment 464294

He averaged 14:12 TOI last year, of which he averaged 1:35 on the penalty kill, and only averaged 0:08 seconds of PP time/60. He clearly knows how to generate chances, with the little time he does get.

But let's just see what Linemate's Ilya was playing with, because you have suggested he did in fact get a good look with the big boys last year.

Ilya - JT - Willy:
View attachment 464295

Ilya without JT and Willy
:
View attachment 464296


so ya, he was largely cemented in a defensive role, with about 12:30 in 5v5 ice, the rest being down a man. All while still producing the 6th most HDCF on the team. So do i think there is a better situation where I could see Ilya improve his totals? Ya, I really do.

This is not a hype train. If Ilya produced to the exact same level as last year, which was a statistical outlier, I would be more than happy with that. He is a highly effective player even when the puck isn't going in the net. But if we look at the data that is there, he should be producing at a higher rate. So if a greater opportunity is going to be there, and if we see even a slight increase in scoring efficiency, there really is no reason to believe the contrary.

Sure if you look at data but the game isn't played by data.

If you look at data alone there are tons of players are 60 point pace given ice time given key opportunities and all that beautiful stuff

He was paired in 2nd line with Tavares and Nylander. He failed to produce

He was with Hyman and he failed to produce

He severely over achieved in his rookie year so everyone holding on to that memory

Kind of Yakuov for 5 years He was drafted. They are not very good at hockey

 

[jaric1862]

I said this in another thread but if he wants to put in the work, there certainly is an opportunity for him in the top 6 this year. He really needs to work on his finishing ability.

 

[NinjaKick]

Let say they promise him top 6 minutes to start I wonder if the lines look like this to start.

ritchie Matthews Nylander
Mikeheyev Tavares Marner
Kerfoot Kampf Kase
Butting speeza simmonds

imo we shouldn't promise him anything. he's gotta earn it.
that said, I like soup alot and hope we can work something out... he's got finish more on those chances though.

 

[justashadowof]

This gobbler is a selfish twit. Buy him out and get rid of him after everything the leafs did for him during his injury and standing by him.

Requesting a trade from a sub mediocre player is a joke. If he doesnt want to be in Toronto, there's the door asshat.

While I sorta get the point about ingratitude, do any of us think the Leafs would have stood by him if they didn't think he still had loads of potential to help the team? The team cut bait on players who absolutely wanted to be here like Brown, Kadri, Gardiner, Kapanen and Johnsson pretty fast when it was expedient to the team's goals. This isn't quite Al Leiter level of ingratitude (for those who remember that).

 

[FreeBird]

If he wants out then dump him. He is next to useless anyways

HOG WASH

 

[zeke]

Sure hope Mikky's wrist improves and he can get back to producing like he did in year 1.

Because of anyone on the team, he's the one with the best shot at replacing what Hyman brought.