News Article: Leafs are now identifiable.

[Welsh Maple Leaf]

Even when we are winning some have excuses to drag us down. Our own fans no less.

 

[Madap]

Bingo! The North is generally considered the weakest division in hockey. Based on the individual talent on this team our team stats should look better than last year. It's not hard to keep bad teams from scoring, in the weakest division, when they are slumping.

Are you going to give zero credit for last nights win? Edmonton was one of the hottest teams in the league, with the best player in the league averaging almost 2 ppg. And we shut them out. Far from "slumping".

It's insane to me how you can watch this team (if you do actually do watch the games and not just parrot whatever the main boards is saying) and think we haven't improved over the years, particularly this year with a new coach and some added players. There's still room for improvement, sure, but you have zero factual basis to sh*t on the Leafs this year. FYI citing last year's winning percentage is not a factual basis, particularly when every team in our division outside of Vancouver had improved in the offseason.

 

[LeafGrief]

It's great to see the team gelling into a cohesive unit. I love the way that all of our forward lines cycle the puck. Some players are better than others at it, but Thornton jumps to mind as an addition who is so incredibly strong on the cycle. It's not surprising that Barabanov is getting a tryout on the 2nd line because he also reads the cycle so well. Our team wide commitment to defense is stronger than ever, and all of our defense pairings are good in transition. Our additions there, Brodie and Bogo, are great transition players relative to their roles. Bogosian in particular has surprised me with a lot of solid outlet passing. It's third pairing outlet passing, it's not amazing, but it's going the right way up the ice. I also think that this team identity of defensive responsibility and heavy cycle is why we're seeing Keefe play the third line of Hyman-Engvall-Mikheyev so much. Hyman is the only guy on that line who's going to score any goals whatsoever, but as a line they play their entire shift in the other team's zone. Keeping the puck deep, gassing the defenders, and not getting scored on are all helping the team win. Yeah,I wish Mikheyev could score some goals, but that line is pretty much the definition of how the team wants to play the game.

The narratives around the rest of the division are hilarious. The fans have already decided that their teams are trash because they don't want to admit that we're any good. It's such nonsense, because even if they are all trash (I'm inclined to agree with them) the fact that we're beating up on them proves that we're the strong link. And frankly, if we were worse and in a dogfight with Edmonton and Winnipeg for 1st, nobody would be calling the division trash. It would be competitive and "a bloodbath".

 

[Confucius]

Leafs are where they should be considering the weak competition, best team in the North League.

Weak division?
Don't be taken in by the naysayers, Detroit, Buffalo, New Jersey, Anaheim, San Jose, Los Angeles all had worse records last year than everybody in the north, save Ottawa.

Last Years Pacific division Only Vegas had a better record than, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary.

Look at this years Honda West, San Jose, Anaheim, L A, Arizona. Now there is a division where the top 4 teams were decided even before game one this year.

The reason the scoring is up in the North is we have the top 4 offensive players.

 

[ToneDog]

Weak division?
Don't be taken in by the naysayers, Detroit, Buffalo, New Jersey, Anaheim, San Jose, Los Angeles all had worse records last year than everybody in the north, save Ottawa.

Last Years Pacific division Only Vegas had a better record than, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary.

Look at this years Honda West, San Jose, Anaheim, L A, Arizona. Now there is a division where the top 4 teams were decided even before game one this year.

The reason the scoring is up is we have the top 4 offensive players in the north.

With the Habs and Flames now playing poorly that leaves 3 solid teams in the North. Oilers are nothing without McD and Drai leaving you with the Leafs and Jets. The East is by far the class of the NHL with 5 solid teams IMO.

 

[darrylsittler27]

Let's face it, everyone hates the Leafs. From the announcers to the media. They cant admit with Simmonds and Bogo in the lineup we can play any game you want to play. We have the best offense in the league, we have a top 10 defense and the best goaltending tandem in hockey. We may even have two starters. The fact that we can't play other teams is neither our fault nor does it prove anything. If we were beating up on Boston and Tampa Bay they would claim the other team had major injuries while we had Mathews and Simmonds out, it is a joke.

 

[nsleaf]

Weak division?
Don't be taken in by the naysayers, Detroit, Buffalo, New Jersey, Anaheim, San Jose, Los Angeles all had worse records last year than everybody in the north, save Ottawa.

Last Years Pacific division Only Vegas had a better record than, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary.

Look at this years Honda West, San Jose, Anaheim, L A, Arizona. Now there is a division where the top 4 teams were decided even before game one this year.

The reason the scoring is up in the North is we have the top 4 offensive players.

Its weak compared to the NHL as a whole. Its hard to rate them when they don't play some of the leagues best. Its not a knock on the Leafs, all teams/divisions are in the same boat this season but one has to wonder if they would be doing as well in the traditional schedule.

 

[Menzinger]

Edmonton is a horrid team and we have played Winterpg once when they were struggling.

They also have two of best offensive stars in the league....

Their team is flawed, but they can score quite well (and in turn were shut out last night regardless)

 

[Confucius]

Its weak compared to the NHL as a whole. Its hard to rate them when they don't play some of the leagues best. Its not a knock on the Leafs, all teams/divisions are in the same boat this season but one has to wonder if they would be doing as well in the traditional schedule.

Are the Leafs the best team? That is debatable. There is more offense than defence in the North, does that make the north a weaker division? No they have just as much talent as any division in the league. They are not from the weakest division. That's all I meant.

 

[Brobust]

that's what happens when Prez-GM-Coach-Team are all on the same page.

Does it worry you that they're not dominating teams?

 

[zeke]

Does it worry you that they're not dominating teams?

I think we are?

3rd in goal differential and 7th expected goal differential....and that's after a slow start.

In February they were #2 in goal differential and #2 in expected goal differential.

Hard to do much better than that.

 

[Sypher04]

I'm so sick of this "the north is weak" argument. It's not based on anything real. It's just being used as an attempt to diminish what we are accomplishing and it's so obviously dishonest.

Its almost enough to make me want the North to win the cup this year, whether it's us or not

 

[Brobust]

I'm just saying that MM and AM are in a place, in terms of production, where they have never been before. CM and LD in Edm , have produced at the pace they are currently at. Our success IMO is more related to two world class players playing above their career norms. The key for me is what is normal. If the system was the reason, you'd see our 2nd line, which could be a first line on many teams, succeed as well.

I'm happy they think that defence is powering this 1st place position, IMO AM and MM are the 1st, 2nd and 3rd reason why we are in 1st place. Take the two Calgary games for example, they made a point of shutting down AM and MM, 0 goals in 2 games, resulted in one loss and a lucky bounce in game 2 where we scored with the goalie pulled. If MM and AM don't score, we typically don't win.

It's not heavily luck driven bumps in production. They are dominating play.

This isn't William Karlsson and Mika Zibanejad we're talking about.

 

[Jimmy Firecracker]

Does it worry you that they're not dominating teams?

I mean, that was an issue in the first two or three weeks of the season, when Montreal had an ungodly shooting percentage and lighting up teams while we were just grinding out wins. But since the Canucks series we've been capably dummying teams like Vancouver, Edmonton, Montreal, and Ottawa.

I'm so sick of this "the north is weak" argument. It's not based on anything real. It's just being used as an attempt to diminish what we are accomplishing and it's so obviously dishonest.

Its almost enough to make me want the North to win the cup this year, whether it's us or not

Anti-Leafs bias is strong. There are plenty of mediocre to bad teams in the Central and West, but for some reason Minnesota's and Chicago's meteoric rises don't get so much as an eyebrow raise from other fans, but the Leafs being in first in the North has people tripping over each other to declare it as the worst division in the league. Like come on, half of the Pacific division was in the bottom 10 of the league last year, and 3 out of those 4 were in the bottom 5. But the North is just so bad you guys.

Sad thing is no other Canadian fan base will stand up for the pride of their teams. They'll shoot themselves in the foot insulting themselves to get shots in at the Leafs. "Um actually, my team is pretty garbage so the Leafs leading the division is pretty unimpressive."

 

[Bluelines]

It's not heavily luck driven bumps in production. They are dominating play.

This isn't William Karlsson and Mika Zibanejad we're talking about.

Agreed, hard work and skill, well deserved bump in production.

 

[Bluelines]

They also have two of best offensive stars in the league....

Their team is flawed, but they can score quite well (and in turn were shut out last night regardless)

Agreed.

 

[Bluelines]

Are you going to give zero credit for last nights win? Edmonton was one of the hottest teams in the league, with the best player in the league averaging almost 2 ppg. And we shut them out. Far from "slumping".

It's insane to me how you can watch this team (if you do actually do watch the games and not just parrot whatever the main boards is saying) and think we haven't improved over the years, particularly this year with a new coach and some added players. There's still room for improvement, sure, but you have zero factual basis to sh*t on the Leafs this year. FYI citing last year's winning percentage is not a factual basis, particularly when every team in our division outside of Vancouver had improved in the offseason.

Nope, I give all the credit in the world to the Leafs, great game. Was it system, individual skill or the other team not playing well enough? I guess we will see in their next game. If the Leafs have improved systematically and their identity is a commitment to sold defensive play, like the article suggests, they should be able to rinse, wash repeat that performance in their next game. I personally feel our great record is more due to elite individual skill, that's a great thing to have when teams are playing loosie goosy early in the season hockey.

 

[Bluelines]

Did you consider the leafs to be overwhelming favorites in the division coming into the season?

Not overwhelming but in the mix for first.

 

[zeke]

Not overwhelming but in the mix for first.

So why are you not impressed that they are pummeling the division you thought they were just in the mix for?

 

[willmma]

Leafs are 2nd in the league in GF/GP
and are 6th in the league in GA/GP (while playing a bad division, its bad because these teams are able to score a lot of goals... very bad.)

Leafs are 2nd in the league in Goal Diff/GP in the league.

#	Team	GP	GF	GA	GF/GP	GA/GP	Diff/GP
1	Tampa Bay Lightning	19	69	39	3.63	2.05	1.58
2	Toronto Maple Leafs	22	78	55	3.55	2.5	1.05
3	Vegas Golden Knights	17	51	35	3	2.06	0.94
4	Winnipeg Jets	20	69	52	3.45	2.6	0.85
5	Colorado Avalanche	18	55	42	3.06	2.33	0.73
6	Minnesota Wild	18	57	44	3.17	2.44	0.73
7	Philadelphia Flyers	18	61	52	3.39	2.89	0.5
8	Florida Panthers	20	64	55	3.2	2.75	0.45
9	Carolina Hurricanes	20	65	56	3.25	2.8	0.45
10	Edmonton Oilers	23	79	69	3.43	3	0.43
11	New York Islanders	21	56	48	2.67	2.29	0.38
12	Boston Bruins	19	57	50	3	2.63	0.37
13	Montréal Canadiens	20	65	58	3.25	2.9	0.35
14	Chicago Blackhawks	23	72	66	3.13	2.87	0.26
15	Washington Capitals	21	72	67	3.43	3.19	0.24
16	Los Angeles Kings	20	59	55	2.95	2.75	0.2
17	Dallas Stars	16	46	43	2.88	2.69	0.19
18	St. Louis Blues	21	66	65	3.14	3.1	0.04
19	New York Rangers	19	49	51	2.58	2.68	-0.1
20	New Jersey Devils	17	45	50	2.65	2.94	-0.29
21	Calgary Flames	22	57	65	2.59	2.95	-0.36
22	Arizona Coyotes	21	54	62	2.57	2.95	-0.38
23	Pittsburgh Penguins	20	57	65	2.85	3.25	-0.4
24	Columbus Blue Jackets	23	61	75	2.65	3.26	-0.61
25	Buffalo Sabres	19	42	56	2.21	2.95	-0.74
26	Vancouver Canucks	24	67	85	2.79	3.54	-0.75
27	Nashville Predators	21	48	64	2.29	3.05	-0.76
28	Anaheim Ducks	21	41	59	1.95	2.81	-0.86
29	Detroit Red Wings	24	51	78	2.13	3.25	-1.12
30	San Jose Sharks	18	49	70	2.72	3.89	-1.17
31	Ottawa Senators	23	60	91	2.61	3.96	-1.35

[TBODY] [/TBODY]

 

[Bluelines]

So why are you not impressed that they are pummeling the division you thought they were just in the mix for?

Dude stop, don't put words in my mouth. Your bad at stats and bad at debate.

 

[zeke]

Dude stop, don't put words in my mouth. Your bad at stats and bad at debate.

Why do you refuse to give credit to the team for pummeling a division you thought they were just "in the mix" for a month ago?

 

[Bluelines]

Why do you refuse to give credit to the team for pummeling a division you thought they were just "in the mix" for a month ago?

I give credit to individual players who have had incredible years. Fortunately for us fans, the Leaf's have benefitted in the standings from that elite individual play.

 

[BlueForever75]

I have no issue beating up on weaker teams. Its allowing us to keep practicing a style that will make us successful in the playoffs. Look at that game against Edmonton, 4-0!!

Its not easy to shutdown a team like that without your star player. They did it.

 

[zeke]

I give credit to individual players who have had incredible years. Fortunately for us fans, the Leaf's have benefitted in the standings from that elite individual play.

Which individuals are responsible for the Leafs being 6th in the league in goals allowed and 7th in shots allowed?