Kyle Dubas will not be back as GM

[MessierII]

Posts like this are hilarious. Besides Tavares who signed as a UFA, do you actually consider nylander marner Matthews contracts bad? Cause if so that’s all I need to know

There’s been two 10+ million dollar contracts ever that didn’t get max term. Guess who?

 

[Frank Drebin]

lt's common sense. lf l pulled a power trip on my employer, it wouldn't end well. He found out the hard way.

He f***ed around and found out

 

[MCR74]

He f***ed around and found out

Exactly. l've no sympathy whatsoever.

 

[John Price]

 

[krutovsdonut]

I thought he made good trades, but he signs bad deals and he had a 4 year window

this.

It all stems back to blowing $11M on Tavares instead of improving defense, when you already had a franchise 1C.

this

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

At the end of the day I truly think Shanahan didn't want Dubas back nor did Dubas really want to be here. He was most likely told you're back but need to fire Keefe and trade a core piece.

Best way to not do that?

Ask for more money and other concessions that you know you're not gonna get.

Case closed.


Also wanted to mention that going into the season as a lame duck coach or GM is never a good thing. Ego comes into it. I saw it with Trotz and the Caps and now with the Leafs and Dubas. I know Trotz won the Cup and then the narrative was that the Caps didn't want to pay him.

Truth was that Trotz already had decided during that season that he was slighted by the Caps by starting that season without a contract and nothing was bringing him back. Not even a Cup.

I know Dubas didn't win a Cup but never underestimate what pride and ego can do. On some levels I bet you he felt slighted and that friction between him and Shanahan was only getting worse.

I firmly believe that both sides wanted to part ways and did it in a way to save face and image.

Wouldn’t the best way to do it be to announce that you’re just moving on?

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

This is on dubas for signing JT
It wasn't needed and he has the same skill set as mathews marner and Nylander.
Skilled and soft.
JT was never worth his contract

When JT was signed, most people felt like he was a huge piece to winning a cup. And really, they should’ve done much better than they have. You couldn’t have predicted that Marner would shit the bed every year.

Another thing to consider is that Tavares got badly hurt in the Montreal series and hasn’t been the same since.

Yes, he gave too much to his core. Yes he never should’ve made Tavares captain. But as far as mistakes go, signing a huge star to put you over shouldn’t rank as a terrible mistake.

 

[BallardEra]

Wouldn’t the best way to do it be to announce that you’re just moving on?

You'd think so but with egos involved and trying to maintain your image it's always more complicated than it has to be.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

You'd think so but with egos involved and trying to maintain your image it's always more complicated than it has to be.

How would getting yourself fired help your image? I guess I don’t get that part.

Way better to just say - I’m out.

 

[Negan4Coach]

Well, def took its toll. You know you’re losing it when you’re getting into it with bottles and random fans.

LOL. Well, I'd probably get into it with fans if I managed to sign all those big ticket superstars only to watch them lose. I mean I'd be climbing the walls, chewing on the carpet, etc.

 

[jcs0218]

I agree with Sid Seixeiro. Everything he wrote here is true.

 

[Lazlo Hollyfeld]

I mean, when you put it that way...

 

[jcs0218]

Am I the only person that thinks Kyle Dubas has maturity problems?

 

[BallardEra]

How would getting yourself fired help your image? I guess I don’t get that part.

Way better to just say - I’m out.

It looks better than walking away from a deal. That way everyone blames Dubas for what's left (Keefe, Core 4) and blaming him for the "mess" that he left.

This way he can say he wanted to stay but they got rid of him and he's not forced to fire Keefe or trade Marner or Nylander.

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

I agree with Sid Seixeiro. Everything he wrote here is true.

The problem with that tweet is 99.9% of Toronto fans argued that all those things listed were considered positives in Dubas' favor.

It seems like only now that Dubas is out that suddenly Toronto's fans have an issue with those listed items. I know this firsthand because I had NUMEROUS discussions with Leaf fans over the years pertaining to the Tavares, Marner and Matthews contracts.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

It looks better than walking away from a deal. That way everyone blames Dubas for what's left (Keefe, Core 4) and blaming him for the "mess" that he left.

This way he can say he wanted to stay but they got rid of him and he's not forced to fire Keefe or trade Marner or Nylander.

Why wouldn’t he just say - I don’t have full autonomy here and this is no longer a fit - that makes way more sense than what just happened.

 

[BallardEra]

Why wouldn’t he just say - I don’t have full autonomy here and this is no longer a fit - that makes way more sense than what just happened.

We don't know his side of the story. Maybe he expected to have that and the deal Shanahan offered him didn't have it. Maybe Dubas' counter offer did.

Bottom line is Dubas and Shanahan weren't seeing eye to eye for almost two years now.

If both sides "truly" wanted to make it happen, they could have.

I'm actually shocked that Shanahan isn't gone too. He seems like a bigger fraud to me than Dubas is.

 

[jcs0218]

The problem with that tweet is 99.9% of Toronto fans argued that all those things listed were considered positives in Dubas' favor.

It seems like only now that Dubas is out that suddenly Toronto's fans have an issue with those listed items. I know this firsthand because I had NUMEROUS discussions with Leaf fans over the years pertaining to the Tavares, Marner and Matthews contracts.

Those Maple Leafs fans who you had discussions with and argued with were delusional.

 

[Lafleurs Guy]

The problem with that tweet is 99.9% of Toronto fans argued that all those things listed were considered positives in Dubas' favor.

It seems like only now that Dubas is out that suddenly Toronto's fans have an issue with those listed items. I know this firsthand because I had NUMEROUS discussions with Leaf fans over the years pertaining to the Tavares, Marner and Matthews contracts.

This is simply not true. And there are tons of threads on the TO forum that corroborate this. Nobody liked those contracts.

The Tavares move was bold and made a lot of sense. It’s too bad Dubas couldn’t get a lower priced deal on it though because it had a huge cascading effect on the other players and Dubas did a really poor job negotiating those.

 

[KMNRB]

In a quick review of Dubas' tenure, I would say that he has been excellent at getting bargain valued supports given very limited cap space. At the same time, it seems after Friday that he buys in the notion that young hotshots with no proven success when it matters most (players or GM) deserve to get paid big in Toronto beyond market values. In other words, he is likely willing to pay anything Matthews asked for (we are already seeing the agent at work with the media again, talking about the rare franchise center who should get any money he wants, in spite of his lack of playoffs success).

So he would probably do a good job if the team has already signed the big stars to good long term deals (e.g., like NJ). But he appears to negotiate on the side of star players over others (he did negotiate decently well with the supporting players). It is proven in the past few years that tying up the caps to a few stars doesn't work for playoffs hockey (though it did work for regular season hockey). Just imagine, had Dubas stayed, Matthews may sign an extension but for something like $13.5 to $14 mil for 5 years. Then Nylander at $10.5 for 8 and Mitch at $13 for 8. Essentially the three takes up the money with Tavares gone. That's probably the vision Dubas has had (though he was willing to make some adjustment when he was willing to trade them during his last press conference as Leaf GM). If they had performed like McDavid, Draisaitl, Mackinnon, or Matthew Tkachuk in the playoffs, then maybe tying up that much money in 3 players still make sense. But when they have proven year-in and year-out that they are not as clutch as those players, those UFA contracts will potentially look even worse than their RFA ones and it would seem that Dubas would have been the only GM in NHL willing to hand out those contracts.

In retrospect, if Dubas didn't force Lou out with the Colorado rumor and let Lou handled the negotiation w Nylander, Matthews, and Marner before taking over the GM job, the state of the team would have been in much better shape than it is today.

 

[Turin]

Good Dubas: Tavares (yes, Tavares), Bunting, Muzzin, Brodie, Campbell, Spezza, Samsonov, Kampf, trading Kapanen for a first, Hallander and Evan Rodrigues, O'Rielly, Acciari, Schenn, firing Babcock, Lyubushkin. Was able to keep core young players.

Bad Dubas: messed the chemistry too much in the last deadline. Acquiring Barrie made zero sense. Protected Kerfoot over McCann in expansion draft. Lost Barabanov, Marchment, Rodrigues for nothing. Clearly got sour over Sandin and should have just told him to shut up instead of trading him for a late pick and a player they didn't need. Trading for Matt Murray was way too galaxy brain whenit was obvious that he is damaged goods and his body will never let him play hockey consistently again. Didn't play hardball enough on Marner and Matthews. Prioritizing Foligno over Hall.

Unfortunate Dubas: Inheriting Marleau and Zaitsev contracts and being forced to spend assets to get rid of them. Foligno getting injured. Inheriting Babcock who he couldn't fire immediately and who got soundly outcoached vs Boston.

One thing that sticks out to me is the players he lost for nothing, players you'd think he would have liked. Guys like Barabanov, Marchment and Rodrigues.

 

[General Fanager]

Agreed. Dubas created this drama, when it was about money. Nothing wrong to want more, no problem. But this oh woes me and my poor family oh me oh my. Playing off the media and public, games with Shanahan. Lol. High school level drama. Wow, Leafs should be happy this guy is gone after this display.

I am not picking sides but I do have a question. The team did not offer him a new deal last summer and they said lets wait and see, then when the season is over he says he wants to have a few days to go over all of it with his family and he is out?

Thats kinda crappy imo. The team can play wait and see but wont even give him a few days to discuss with his family.

 

[McVespa99]

Tavares was good for toronto until only recently, people seem to forget that

Whether he was good or not does not matter. He was a bad allocation of cap space. That is the issue. If there was no cap it would have been a great signing. Unfortunately for Leafs fans it was not.

 

[Turin]

I am not picking sides but I do have a question. The team did not offer him a new deal last summer and they said lets wait and see, then when the season is over he says he wants to have a few days to go over all of it with his family and he is out?

Thats kinda crappy imo. The team can play wait and see but wont even give him a few days to discuss with his family.

I think Dubas was willing to play chicken in this respect, and although he got burned I don't think he was completely blindsided or unware of the possibility of that happening. There's a lot of hoopla on Canadian sports radio about how AMAZING it is to be the GM of the Leafs, but if you're a known commodity who will have options, it's not that amazing.

 

[McVespa99]

Posts like this are hilarious. Besides Tavares who signed as a UFA, do you actually consider nylander marner Matthews contracts bad? Cause if so that’s all I need to know

Those contracts were all bad when signed. Very bad. Marners is still bad. That cap hit for a regular season winger...
And by the way Matthews contract is still bad too due to the lack of term. If you are going to overpay a guy you think will be a star you better get some ufa years on the back end