No More Soft Players & Career Losers On The 3rd & 4th Lines

[Nylander88]

Nobody should have wanted Thornton. Simmonds was a gamble, but Bogosian was an obvious great signing at the time.

Personally would take both Bogosian and Simmonds back in a heartbeat. Thornton, Mikheyev, Engvall should be switched out. Robertson is a hard worker and goal scorer, he should get a spot. Anderson and Brooks can fight for a spot. And a high motor/grit UFA signing. Coleman, McGinn, Goodrow, Cizikas would all be nice adds. Wouldn't mind getting a couple of the above mentioned

 

[Dreakmur]

Personally would take both Bogosian and Simmonds back in a heartbeat. Thornton, Mikheyev, Engvall should be switched out. Robertson is a hard worker and goal scorer, he should get a spot. Anderson and Brooks can fight for a spot. And a high motor/grit UFA signing. Coleman, McGinn, Goodrow, Cizikas would all be nice adds. Wouldn't mind getting a couple of the above mentioned

Brooks would be ok, but we neee a PKer in that 4th C slot.

 

[Donnie740]

But let’s be real. Bringing in a couple of guys for “grit” doesn’t solve the problem when the guys driving the bus don’t have it.

You can’t build 2/3 identities in your team.
You get 1 Hyman on a soft team or a Simmonds on the 4th. The leaders are going to set the identity. It filters down. That’s why people start asking why did player x stop hitting or whatever.
You conform to the leaders.

Ever been to a bar where some 5’8” 160lb little guy is there with some friends who all happen to be 6’5” 275lb legit bad ass football player types?

It’s amazing how mouthy and courageous little guys like that get when they know they’ve got a few legit bad asses ready to go.

Same thing applies in hockey.

The Leafs have very few leaders. And they have absolutely none who are the physical and aggressive type leaders. Did Marner look like a “leader” when he was constantly hanging his head and playing with ZERO confidence for the entire series?

Did Matthews look like a physical and aggressive leader while he was getting rag dolled and just smiling politely while he got thrown around?

That’s why they choke so badly in the playoffs every year. Adversity arrives and there’s nobody to stand up and follow my lead.

I can promise you that Marner and Matthews will follow.

 

[danny90]

Agree 100% - - Mykheyev and Engvall are worthless trash hockey players.

The Leafs desperately need some winners. I can’t stress this enough. They need guys who’ve won a Cup and understand what it takes - - and they can’t be afraid to tell the young players on the 1st and 2nd lines what they need to do in order to win.

Guys on the 3rd and 4th line need to do at least ONE THING very well.

Maybe they kill penalties very well...maybe they agitate opponents and stir up shit very well ...maybe they win face offs very well....maybe they play the role of a lock down defensive forward...maybe they hit and intimidate very well.

Can’t waste a half dozen roster spots on a bunch of Spanky TryHard types just out there taking up space and going for a skate.

Way too many of those types already in Toronto.

Starting to think this is a parody account

 

[dubplatepressure]

Starting to think this is a parody account

I have been thinking the same thing. It's just too much. It's definitely relentless, borderline insufferable.

 

[Donnie740]

Starting to think this is a parody account

I stand by my assessments of Mikheyev and Engvall. Both are trash.

But I’d definitely be interested to hear your reasoning for believing otherwise.

 

[BigGulpsEh]

Why do people keep saying we needed a few more goals from the bottom 6? How about the guys in the top 6....

We scored 18 goals against Montreal:
Top 6 - 7 goals
Bottom 6 - 6 goals
Defense - 5 goals

Boom! Mic drop

 

[dubplatepressure]

I stand by my assessments of Mikheyev and Engvall. Both are trash.

But I’d definitely be interested to hear your reasoning for believing otherwise.

Mickey needs another season to potentially regain form from his injury, and Engvall is 4th line / replacement level. No point arguing over the scraps. But let's not pretend either of these guys was in any real way responsible for our post season disappointment.

 

[Larcos_Unal]

Why do people keep saying we needed a few more goals from the bottom 6? How about the guys in the top 6....

We scored 18 goals against Montreal:
Top 6 - 7 goals
Bottom 6 - 6 goals
Defense - 5 goals

I get that the stats are close, but you're also trying to make it seem as though 7 goals were the expectation of the top 6. The top 6 completely shit the bed outside of Nylander and it should not have been close at all.

 

[m1ker]

I'm in the market research industry so i understand how advanced stats can be very powerful. Where it fails with the leafs is we don't have enough playoff sample size to build any models on so we are stuck building models using the regular season. I think we all understand now that the playoffs is a completely different animal compared to the regular season.

 

[Donnie740]

Mickey needs another season to potentially regain form from his injury, and Engvall is 4th line / replacement level. No point arguing over the scraps. But let's not pretend either of these guys was in any real way responsible for our post season disappointment.

This is not NHL21, my friend - - one line, or even two lines, isn’t going to carry an entire team through the playoffs.

Championship teams get key contribution from all four lines. Watch the games and see for yourself.

And then some clueless GMs will offer bottom six guys from a championship team $4m or $5m per.

 

[HolyCrap]

I get that the stats are close, but you're also trying to make it seem as though 7 goals were the expectation of the top 6. The top 6 completely shit the bed outside of Nylander and it should not have been close at all.

I think he’s saying the opposite, that the top 6 didn’t produce as expected.

 

[Larcos_Unal]

No the reason we lost wasn't our bottom 6 which uses up 11 of the 80 million dollar cap.

The point he's trying to make is that we're not going to be in a position like other teams, where they can put competent players making $3-4M per year on the 3rd line and get a little production from them. We have one guy making over $3M in Kerfoot and the rest are essentially non-factors like Mikheyev or over the hill vets like Simmonds and Jumbo.

We can't have a balanced lineup and the bottom 6 is patchwork. When the top 6 are nullified there's nobody else to pick up the slack. But Dubas will continue to draft 5'9 Finnish defensemen and 5'10 college forwards cause you know...it's not like a physical blue line like the Habs have would be valuable in the playoffs??

 

[dubplatepressure]

This is not NHL21, my friend - - one line, or even two lines, isn’t going to carry an entire team through the playoffs.

Championship teams get key contribution from all four lines. Watch the games and see for yourself.

And then some clueless GMs will offer bottom six guys from a championship team $4m or $5m per.

What part of my comment makes you think it's justified reminding me that real life is not a video game?

Your comment literally had no relevance to mine. I have no idea how you even got there.

I don't even know why I engage here.

 

[HellasLEAF]

I'm with the overall sentiment of getting tougher and overall better on the 3rd and 4th line yes.

 

[Donnie740]

We can't have a balanced lineup and the bottom 6 is patchwork. When the top 6 are nullified there's nobody else to pick up the slack. But Dubas will continue to draft 5'9 Finnish defensemen and 5'10 college forwards cause you know...

In addition to having competent players in the bottom six they also need to have different skill sets and attributes than the top six.

Can’t expect a scoring line to also be a checking line or to double as a grind line.
Toronto has the same type of player throughout all four lines - - finesse skaters who play on the perimeter.

The mind boggling thing is that Dubas actually PLANNED to build the roster like this. Four lines of finesse guys skating around the perimeter.

I can’t believe a guy like Shanahan who’s played the game and won championships could be duped so badly by a little kid with some spreadsheets.

 

[dubplatepressure]

Starting to think this is a parody account

Member since May 28th...

 

[Donnie740]

What part of my comment makes you think it's justified reminding me that real life is not a video game?

Your comment literally had no relevance to mine. I have no idea how you even got there.

I don't even know why I engage here.

What part of my comment makes you think it's justified reminding me that real life is not a video game?

Your comment literally had no relevance to mine. I have no idea how you even got there.

I don't even know why I engage here.

Mikheyev and Engvall contributed absolutely NOTHING in the series. Neither did Simmonds or Riley Trash or Foligno for that matter.

All four were just basically passengers along for the ride.

But you insist they’re not “in any real way responsible” for that series loss. Your words, not mine.

Apparently a contribution of ZERO from the bottom six guys is acceptable in your fantasy world. Sounds like an NHL21 video game.

No responsibility during the playoffs for any kind of contribution from bottom six guys like Mikheyev and Engvall according to you.

 

[dubplatepressure]

Mikheyev and Engvall contributed absolutely NOTHING in the series. Neither did Simmonds or Riley Trash or Foligno for that matter.

All four were just basically passengers along for the ride.

But you insist they’re not “in any real way responsible” for that series loss. Your words, not mine.

Apparently a contribution of ZERO from the bottom six guys is acceptable in your fantasy world. Sounds like an NHL21 video game.

No responsibility during the playoffs for any kind of contribution from bottom six guys like Mikheyev and Engvall according to you.

Does Mikheyev and Engvall equal the entire bottom 6?

Would anyone here in their right minds blame the bottom 6 for our playoff loss and not blame our top 6 significantly moreso?

What are you even saying?

 

[Stephen]

Mikheyev and Engvall contributed absolutely NOTHING in the series. Neither did Simmonds or Riley Trash or Foligno for that matter.

All four were just basically passengers along for the ride.

But you insist they’re not “in any real way responsible” for that series loss. Your words, not mine.

Apparently a contribution of ZERO from the bottom six guys is acceptable in your fantasy world. Sounds like an NHL21 video game.

No responsibility during the playoffs for any kind of contribution from bottom six guys like Mikheyev and Engvall according to you.

One of those classic playoff traditions we see year after year are guys like Mikheyev and Engvall getting hot at unexpected times and contributing a lot of timely offense from the bottom 6.

Just compare and contrast the offensive black hole that is Joel Armia as reference and the uptick in his ice time as the playoffs wears on. Starts out playing single digit minutes but gets a little more confidence every game and is now up to 16 minutes. Maybe our star forwards don't need Ryan Suter ice time.

 

[swint]

Does Mikheyev and Engvall equal the entire bottom 6?

Would anyone here in their right minds blame the bottom 6 for our playoff loss and not blame our top 6 significantly moreso?

What are you even saying?

I would blame a lot of it on the bottom 6, myself. Matthews and Marner didn’t really produce, but they were the main defensive focus of the Habs. We brought in guys like Thornton, and Simmonds, and Foligno to bring grit and tenacity and got absolutely nothing. Engvall and Mikheyev are always the worst players on the ice when they’re on. You can’t have playoff success relying on 4 guys to do everything.

Source: Every successful team ever

 

[dubplatepressure]

I would blame a lot of it on the bottom 6, myself. Matthews and Marner didn’t really produce, but they were the main defensive focus of the Habs. We brought in guys like Thornton, and Simmonds, and Foligno to bring grit and tenacity and got absolutely nothing. Engvall and Mikheyev are always the worst players on the ice when they’re on. You can’t have playoff success relying on 4 guys to do everything.

Source: Every successful team ever

again - not saying they are not deserving of any blame. Comparatively however, there's no question who deserves more blame - and it's not the f***ing scrubs on the bottom 6.

 

[Gallagbi]

I would blame a lot of it on the bottom 6, myself. Matthews and Marner didn’t really produce, but they were the main defensive focus of the Habs. We brought in guys like Thornton, and Simmonds, and Foligno to bring grit and tenacity and got absolutely nothing. Engvall and Mikheyev are always the worst players on the ice when they’re on. You can’t have playoff success relying on 4 guys to do everything.

Source: Every successful team ever

Engvall and Mik were fine. Our stars didn't step up and our bottom end (which wasn't them) killed us.

6th D (Sandin/Dermott) and 12th fwd (Thornton) hurt us at critical times. Matthews and Marner weren't a big positive for us in the series, middle 6 mostly did their job.

 

[I am Canadian]

A proper team fills these 700-800k spots with drafted players on elcs. Unfortunately dubas' draft record is borderline terrible.

?!???

 

[keonsbitterness]

?!???

Yeah, too soon to tell about his drafts when he's only been GM for three of them. And Dubas probably relied almost entirely on scouts in 2018 because he was named GM just a month before that draft.