Post-Game Talk: Leafs Lose 2-1

[zeke]

I'm not the one with the problem, the Leafs cap allocation is the problem.

Looks like their cap allocation is working better than most anyone's though.

You have a theory about cap allocation. But it's just a theory. Real life facts are the evidence that decides whether your theory holds water.

 

[IPS]

I agree, it’s a reincarnation of Gauthier, big and oh so soft. We seem to corner the market on these types.

For me, last nights game reinforced this-I was angry from the moment onward that Joel Armia plastered Austin Matthews, no retaliation from anyone! You don’t do that to a teams star player without pushback. Reports say that Matthew’s is hurting now.

And now I read about the hits, something like 45 by the Habs and about 15.

Embarrassed that the Habs physically punished us

How the hell do you watch last night's game and come away with "the Habs physically punished us?"

Did you people even watch the game or just glance at the hits stat and draw your conclusion??

 

[zeke]

I have a different perspective to both production and depth and cap. We have a lead last night,we have a possession game rolling smoothly,Montreal is chasing. They are battling,they are hungry,they are desperate and they are playing good positionally to keep us from getting a second goal.
They are hammering anyone they can with no response. Keefe is on the bench watching the game get away. Watching the possession slip,watching Montreal hang in there.
Insert here Keefe missing Simmonds)

There is a time when you want to get on their defense and pound them down with your bottom 6. We still don’t have the people that do that for you. Engvall,Vesey,Kerfoot,Petan,Boyd and Spezza. That bottom 6 does nothing for slowing them down.
You need a crunching bottom 6.
Thats not a depth problem as much as its a composition problem.
Keefe couldn’t play a short dump and grind and hit and cycling game if he wanted to.
Sabourine,Anderson are there. Them two will be in the lineup if this management has a clue at all. Plus they will add more nasty and get rid of the Nannies we have bottom 6

I disagree - I think speed and strength are more important to shutting a team down than hits are.

I think a Mikheyev-kerfoot-engvall lines has the chance to be a great disrupter and turnover creator that can play against any line, and eventually a 4th line of Simmonds-Boyd-Spezza should be useful too.

 

[Machinae]

The Habs had a massive lead in hits because they couldn't get possession long enough for a leaf to hit them lol

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Looks like their cap allocation is working better than most anyone's though.

You have a theory about cap allocation. But it's just a theory. Real life facts are the evidence that decides whether your theory holds water.

I don’t have a issue with the cap.
Boyd-3 hits in 7 games
Spezza 4 hits in 14 games
Kerfoot 5 hits in 15 games
Vesey 11 hits in 15 games
Engvall 9 hits in 6 games
Petan 3 hits in 4 games
Barabanov 3 hits in 7 games. Thats 38 hits combined in 68 games combined.

Thats a whopping 1.78 hits per game average for the group. The entire group, that my friend is a No Hit bottom six.

 

[Gary Nylund]

I was addressing him talking about them bouncing us in the playin round when I said 5 games. And he dragged in their past playoff successes (as in the ones pre last summer) which I stand by don't mean much given how much turn over their team has seen. We also have clearly shown we've taken a step this year while Columbus' offseason yet again was them moving out or losing more players with the exception of the Anderson trade where they got Domi back at least. And they just lost PLD who was a huge part of their win against us last summer. Who knows yet how Laine fits

PIT had it the worst. Columbus wasn't that bad outside of losing Jones for 15 games. They lost Bjorkstrand and Atkinson but that doesn't compare to our injuries on the back end and our depth.

We also had to deal with 20 games of crap under Babcock, which was the main reason they were even close.

Oh I agree we're better than CLB, or at least we should be. But still, gotta respect what they've been able to do, especially last season after losing several key players.

 

[zeke]

I don’t have a issue with the cap.
Boyd-3 hits in 7 games
Spezza 4 hits in 14 games
Kerfoot 5 hits in 15 games
Vesey 11 hits in 15 games
Engvall 9 hits in 6 games
Petan 3 hits in 4 games
Barabanov 3 hits in 7 games. Thats 38 hits combined in 68 games combined.

Thats a whopping 1.78 hits per game average for the group.

Hits per game

Simmonds 1.6
Engvall 1.5
Vesey 0.7
Thornton 0.6
Boyd 0.4
Kerfoot 0.3
Spezza 0.3

 

[Sypher04]

How the hell do you watch last night's game and come away with "the Habs physically punished us?"

Did you people even watch the game or just glance at the hits stat and draw your conclusion??

Sadly we know that's gonna be the narrative that gets run with regardless

 

[cave troll]

The Habs had a massive lead in hits because they couldn't get possession long enough for a leaf to hit them lol

Yes, That certainly applied for 1st period, but as the game went on, all those hits started to make a difference in the 3rd.
Hit after hit starts to wear you down a bit.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

I disagree - I think speed and strength are more important to shutting a team down than hits are.

I think a Mikheyev-kerfoot-engvall lines has the chance to be a great disrupter and turnover creator that can play against any line, and eventually a 4th line of Simmonds-Boyd-Spezza should be useful too.

Ok. I see changes coming. You like kerfoot as a center, and I don’t. He’s a weak 3 rd line center that you start automatically chasing the puck with because he loses more faceoffs than he wins for starters, doesn’t hit and doesn’t score and takes bad weak penalties. He’s not a character player that wears down any defense on any team. They skate fast and kill minutes. I don’t like it.
Simmonds is on the Tavares line. Mikheyev Boyd and Spezza i like. Robertson,Thornton and Simmonds take three spots. We need a couple bangers.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Hits per game

Simmonds 1.6
Engvall 1.5
Vesey 0.7
Thornton 0.6
Boyd 0.4
Kerfoot 0.3
Spezza 0.3

Seriously you value them enough to compare them to Simmonds and what he brings to a game. These guy are meek man. Maybe we should count the hits in decibels then for you to get it. Then calculate character,and presence in to that. You don’t get character players and intangibles got it. I don’t know what you’ll think when some of these guys are gone before playoffs.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Yes, That certainly applied for 1st period, but as the game went on, all those hits started to make a difference in the 3rd.
Hit after hit starts to wear you down a bit.

This board only understands granny hockey bro. I hear ya

 

[ToneDog]

Seriously you value them enough to compare them to Simmonds and what he brings to a game. These guy are meek man. Maybe we should count the hits in decibels then for you to get it. Then calculate character,and presence in to that. You don’t get character players and intangibles got it. I don’t know what you’ll think when some of these guys are gone before playoffs.

Problem with analytics people is they don't know how to measure and how important intangebles are. Rather look what the numbers tell. You know like when the GM claims that Ceci is a good dman when your eyes tell you different. How many on this board shot down any mention of Simmonds the past few years. Now that they have seen him in blue and white, they see he brings more than what the numbers show.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Problem with analytics people is they don't know how to measure and how important intangebles are. Rather look what the numbers tell. You know like when the GM claims that Ceci is a good dman when your eyes tell you different. How many on this board shot down any mention of Simmonds the past few years. Now that they have seen him in blue and white, they see he brings more than what the numbers show.

There are a certain group around here that persistently argued hard against intangibles. I’m around long enough to know who they are . Really you are being to nice to them. They don’t have a clue about the game actually. Just the numbers. They don’t get it that you pound a team that played the night before and they wear down after a bit. They don’t come on stronger in the third if you have a bottom 6 investing hits and cycling them to death and a fight and slash. Etc they don’t get it that protecting a lead is in hitting,cycling and wearing down the defense minimum. . They just don’t get it.
4 f****** first round playoff exits later and they love these f**** nannies. Thats insanity. I don’t give two hoots what they say

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Problem with analytics people is they don't know how to measure and how important intangebles are. Rather look what the numbers tell. You know like when the GM claims that Ceci is a good dman when your eyes tell you different. How many on this board shot down any mention of Simmonds the past few years. Now that they have seen him in blue and white, they see he brings more than what the numbers show.

Great post

 

[zeke]

Ok. I see changes coming. You like kerfoot as a center, and I don’t. He’s a weak 3 rd line center that you start automatically chasing the puck with because he loses more faceoffs than he wins for starters, doesn’t hit and doesn’t score and takes bad weak penalties. He’s not a character player that wears down any defense on any team. They skate fast and kill minutes. I don’t like it.
Simmonds is on the Tavares line. Mikheyev Boyd and Spezza i like. Robertson,Thornton and Simmonds take three spots. We need a couple bangers.

I think it's it's exact opposite - we have the puck most of the time when kerfoot is out there, and usually in the offensive zone. It's the other team chasing.

The frustrating thing is that kerfoot is not great at turning that into legit scoring chances.

 

[zeke]

Problem with analytics people is they don't know how to measure and how important intangebles are. Rather look what the numbers tell. You know like when the GM claims that Ceci is a good dman when your eyes tell you different. How many on this board shot down any mention of Simmonds the past few years. Now that they have seen him in blue and white, they see he brings more than what the numbers show.

Both Simmonds' numbers and his eye test have been massively better this year than they've been in years.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

I think it's it's exact opposite - we have the puck most of the time when kerfoot is out there, and usually in the offensive zone. It's the other team chasing.

The frustrating thing is that kerfoot is not great at turning that into legit scoring chances.

You are the numbers guy put up his faceoff % and win loss record. He starts without the puck more than with it. You think its opposite do ya. Oh pk that's good. Have fun with thst. Wow

 

[Wafflewhipper]

You are the numbers guy put up his faceoff % and win loss record. He starts without the puck more than with it. You think its opposite do ya. Oh pk that's good. Have fun with thst. Wow

Kerfoot starts in the offensive zone most of the time too. He is 42% on faceoffs. Horrible

 

[zeke]

Kerfoot starts in the offensive zone most of the time too

Starts the least in the offensive zone of any player on the team, actually.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Starts the least in the offensive zone of any player on the team, actually.

42% on faceoffs. He’d be much better on the wing of Tavares

 

[Aashir]

I don’t think I would mess around with breaking up the first line, they are successful on almost every shift.
Robertson should play on the second line when he returns, if that doesn’t work, then you drop Willie to the 4th line or make him a healthy scratch for a game or two until he wants compete.
If Montreal can make their leading scorer from last year a healthy scratch, then we can sure as hell do the same to Willie.

This is stupid. You don’t drop your 4th best player to the 4th line or scratch him cuz his line isn’t producing. You do that to a 3rd liner. What you do is actually find a way to get Nylander going because when he is on, he is a huge contributor to the team. This team is built on its 4 big forwards, so we can’t afford to bench 1 of them to “send a message”. some people have unrealistic expectations from the $7m player, he isn’t going to produce near marners pace, Marner is just a better player, deal with it. Nylander had chances last game, he didn’t finish and his passes weren’t either. It happens, we move to Ottawa and see if he and Tavares can bounce back.
Also, who would you move up if we take nylander out of the second line. We have bad LW depth right now and with him out owe will have terrible RW depth too.
Hyman - Matthews - Marner
Mikheyev - Tavares - Engvall
Spezza - Kerfoot - Vesey
Sabourin - petan - Andersen

that’s a lineup that will not have a 11-3-1 record.

 

[Wafflewhipper]

Starts the least in the offensive zone of any player on the team, actually.

You are right there. He does start without the puck mostly in the defensive zone

 

[zeke]

You are right there. He does start without the puck mostly in the defensive zone

 

[Menzinger]

This is stupid. You don’t drop your 4th best player to the 4th line or scratch him cuz his line isn’t producing. You do that to a 3rd liner. What you do is actually find a way to get Nylander going because when he is on, he is a huge contributor to the team. This team is built on its 4 big forwards, so we can’t afford to bench 1 of them to “send a message”. some people have unrealistic expectations from the $7m player, he isn’t going to produce near marners pace, Marner is just a better player, deal with it. Nylander had chances last game, he didn’t finish and his passes weren’t either. It happens, we move to Ottawa and see if he and Tavares can bounce back.
Also, who would you move up if we take nylander out of the second line. We have bad LW depth right now and with him out owe will have terrible RW depth too.
Hyman - Matthews - Marner
Mikheyev - Tavares - Engvall
Spezza - Kerfoot - Vesey
Sabourin - petan - Andersen

that’s a lineup that will not have a 11-3-1 record.

Yep. I just don't understand this fixation with punishing players. The point should be to maximize perfomances, not retribution for a lackluster game.