He’s the GM that keeps bringing back that core. You can’t trade Mattews, but you surely could move Marner or Nylander. The amount he paid his core guys was widely considered an overpayment at the time. He then handcuffed himself with the Tavares contract. He’s never fixed the ongoing goalie situation until this year because the guy he brought in to backup Murray is doing well. Even so, we’ll see how he holds up now that it matters.
They’ve been predicted to win 90% of their first round matchups in the last however many years. That should tell you how much they’ve underachieved.
I just don’t get feeling this strongly about defending Kyle Dubas.
Marner is arguably the best 2-way Forward in hockey at this point. He is relied on heavily in all situations and is super consistent. You'd be nuts to throw him away. He's not an overpayment. People who say that don't watch the Leafs. Over the long haul he's their MVP.
Everyone just judges Matthews on goals, but he's also very much underrated away from the puck. How much less should he be earning?
Nylander's another story. He's a slacker defensively. He's like Guentzel basically in terms of impact.
Managed 40 goals, 42 assists at 6.9 mil AAV though. I'm not keen on torching Dubas for keeping him.
Tavares has 354 points in 360 games as a Leaf. 155 goals.
Sure he's overpaid and for too long, but that ~2 mil AAV disparity or whatever in past years is not what's sinking the Leafs. People talk about him like he's worth half his AAV. Even this year 80 points.
Then you got Rielly making 7.5M. Seems totally fair?
All of these guys have been pretty durable as well, which is something people take for granted when assessing value.
There's nothing fundamentally flawed with this core. Ripping it apart is just change for the sake of change, while hoping that their replacements will do more over a 2 week period in the playoffs.
The core would have lower AAV's if they had a tax situation like Tampa.
I take big issue with the Murray trade like everyone else, but the majority of his moves make sense. He gets no credit for his good moves either, like Giordano at 800K x2 or getting Hyman for McKegg.
