The Case For Bringing Back The Core

[Squiffy]

Sooooo they wanna see what the core looks like under different coach with another manager putting their own mark on the team?

I'm not in favor.

Seems logical to me. It's the next thing to try, short of ripping it down. It's nt time to rip it down yet. It's just not. Too soon.

It’s unreal. Post series thread, had to be over 90% united in blowing shit up. Now, it’s crazy how quickly all’s forgotten and forgiven as if the Leafs weren’t limp ghosts who trailed 75% of the playoffs

Logic over emotion is good.

Good. They should be upset and uncomfortable. Time to shake it up.

 

[Donnie740]

Rod Brind'amour is considered one of the best leaders/motivators in the game. Is he failing considering they are down 0-3?

I have to be clear here, I am not defending Keefe. But to suggest a coach needs to motivate fully grown adults to actually play hard I don't buy.

Brind’amour is a fantastic coach and he’s done a tremendous job to get Carolina this far considering they’ve been without three of their top four players for the entire playoffs.

 

[ItsFineImFine]

Makar, Heiskenen, Pietrangelo, Mountour, Slavin, etc......you need a really really good dman and a good core of dmen around him to win a cup usually. Sorry but Morgan Rielly is not on the same level as those guys and there's no way to improve the defence without breaking up the losing 4.

 

[Buds17]

The players under contract? The players slated for free agency?

 

[Boxscore]

Makar, Heiskenen, Pietrangelo, Mountour, Slavin, etc......you need a really really good dman and a good core of dmen around him to win a cup usually. Sorry but Morgan Rielly is not on the same level as those guys and there's no way to improve the defence without breaking up the losing 4.

I'd say Florida is another good example. Their defense, sans Ekblad, is mostly unheralded. Montour has been traded like a baseball card but has really found his niche in Florida thanks to Maurice. Forsling is an absolute stud who is criminally underrated. And Gudas, another guy who many felt was ready for pasture, is playing incredible hockey and hits everything with a pulse.

The Leafs always try to bring in a "Gudas" and they continually fail. Hainsey, McCabe... these guys are/were weak links. To your point -- you need deep, healthy D to go far in the playoffs.

All that said, look at what Matt Tkachuk did for that club. You move out a soft, regular season hero for a unicorn like Tkachuk and... poof... you're one win away from a Cup appearance.

 

[On-the-Fly]

I’ll try to dumb it down for you:

The biggest problem for the Leafs for the past half decade was the GM and coach.

You definitely dumbed things down.

 

[Hockeysawks]

People keep making the " you won't get equal value" argument and to that I say how do you define equal value? For example, let's say you traded Marner for a 70 pt winger who makes a lot less money than Marner, at first glance everyone would think you lost that trade by a lot. But what if the 70 pt winger is big and physical and plays in a way that translates well to the playoffs? Maybe that player ends up being just as effective in the playoffs as Marner and you end up getting a good top 4dman with the extra cap space. You could end up being better off in the playoffs as a result of that trade even though "on paper" it looks like you lost the trade.

It's about restructuring the team and trying a different mix, not just about regular season point totals.

70 point power forwards are hard to find and would be asking for 8+ they need to move 2 biggies to have depth monies

 

[mikeyz]

Carolina about to go down 3-0. If they lose to FLA do they give up on their core?

Ohhh here we go! LMFAO.

Has their core failed 7 years in a row? If so, yes!

I'm sure he said the same thing about every opponent the Lightning beat last year.. . And the Habs the year before.. And the Bruins the 2 years before that..... And the Caps the year before that.

 

[sunstersun]

There is no case. Go look at Marner's 10 career playoff goals. Show me the impressive ones.



This is probably the best one and it's really just the goalie going the wrong direction entirely with the D blocking the goalie.

Just to let Paul Marner know.

There's a difference between this kind of goal.



Versus this kind Nylander of goal.



Or this one.




The goals I see Marner score at lucky saucer passes from the point based purely on luck. No domination, no driving the play, no control of the puck.

Just one more playoff goal to drive home the point for Marner.

 

[ZEBROA]

Only if we in some way can get a Bobrovsky type goalie without trading a core piece.

The difference a okej goalie vs a great goalie does on the whole team is huge.

 

[Notsince67]

The Cassandras around here are hillareous. After Murray gets kicked to the curb, the Leafs have something like 21 million to fill roster spots. "Let's open it up to 50mm to rebuild the team by jettisoning our best players. We can rebuild to cup competitive between 2 and 3 years."
We can do it with no GM in place."
Either leaf land has Manchurian candidates or there is an epidemic of learning disabilities all of a sudden.
Or is it just an influx of low functioning millennials supplementing the regular fools?

 

[weems]

It would be interesting especially in that we definitely played a certain style of hockey and it started with the GM's overall vision.
I can almost gurantee you there's plenty of coach's that would come in and it would take about 1 full game for fans to say, "WOW we play so much differently then before". You could have the team playing a more direct, north/south, finish all your checks, throw tons of pucks on net, zero short cuts style of hockey which is very different than the hold possession at all costs and out talent the opposition strategy.

It would be hilarious if this entire time we had the pieces to win a cup but the overall playstyle and coaching was the biggest issue.

 

[Trapper]

Carolina about to go down 3-0. If they lose to FLA do they give up on their core?

Yes. But since they’ve made it to the conference finals and have had more playoff round success, they only need to move 1.

For 1 round win in 7, Leafs need to move 2.

 

[Nineteen67]

The players under contract? The players slated for free agency?

? The story is evolving

 

[Mickey Marner]

Running it back again, how novel.

 

[Nineteen67]

I'd say Florida is another good example. Their defense, sans Ekblad, is mostly unheralded. Montour has been traded like a baseball card but has really found his niche in Florida thanks to Maurice. Forsling is an absolute stud who is criminally underrated. And Gudas, another guy who many felt was ready for pasture, is playing incredible hockey and hits everything with a pulse.

The Leafs always try to bring in a "Gudas" and they continually fail. Hainsey, McCabe... these guys are/were weak links. To your point -- you need deep, healthy D to go far in the playoffs.

All that said, look at what Matt Tkachuk did for that club. You move out a soft, regular season hero for a unicorn like Tkachuk and... poof... you're one win away from a Cup appearance.

Didn’t Ekblad miss the last two playoffs due to injuries? He’s a big part of their success.
They play hard, we saw that against TB a couple of years ago, yet they felt they needed change. They got lucky that some Florida players convinced Tkachuk that it was a great place to play and he asked to be traded there.

 

[ryno23]

The more you see Bob stone the Canes you have to wonder if the Leafs just got goalied.

So do you believe the core broke thru their 1st round jinx and really outplayed Florida in 4 out of 5 games but BOB stole the series or do you think the core failed to produce in game 2.

If you think the latter then the Canes should be looking at huge changes to their core as the Panther right now or better yet BOB is beating singlehandedly .

As much as it could be the wrong move I am bringing the core 4 back to see what their 1st round breakthru does for their confidence going into the next playoffs. The caveat is there will be a better coach in place to hold the players accountable and force them to play playoff hockey where they need to get to the dirty areas of the ice to score.

The core 4 really only has next year and the year after as once the Tavares deal is done that 11 million comes back on the books for depth and if the next Gm can convince these guys to take a few $$ less in order to win it might work out as you have more depth $$ to play around with.

 

[LEAFANFORLIFE23]

If Shanahan just tried to use Dubas like his puppet or if Dubas didn't full capacity to do what he want as GM, how can we judge him

Easily, we look at the results

 

[LEAFANFORLIFE23]

two things I find wrong with this:

1) Contract-length. If we had all of them on 8 year deals then marner and Matthews would have 4 years left and nylander would have 3. You could go for a rerun with the core with a new coach and gm. With the current contracts, this could potentially walk Matthews and nylander to FA and Marner into his last year. However they could be given extensions so this could turn into nothing, but this leads to my second issue

2) Reason. What have these guys shown to run it back? One round? Marner and Matthews had 6 games, then both went AWOL. Nylander was so inconsistent you wouldn’t know if you would get a 4th liner or the 4th best player in the league. Tavares is the worst signing in sports history. Why bring the guys back.

It took the worst goaltending performance of the playoffs for us to advance. We had to play an equivalent of an AHL goalie to even advance.

Watching florida even now, they aren’t outclassing anyone, they get by with Bob making 4-5 game saving saves and they score 2-3 goals. Carolina getting shutdown makes more sense than us, they have 2 guy on their current team who’s comparable to our big 4. One is performing in Aho, necas has been bad even before this series. This core can be stopped by a single goalie way too often.


I just don’t find any reason to run back another disappointment

The worst signing in sports history? Not even close that's ridiculous

 

[Roo]

Has their core failed 7 years in a row? If so, yes!

If failure is defined as not winning a cup, yes.

 

[thusk]

Easily, we look at the results

I give you 1 exemple... if last summer dubas tried to trade nylander + for Tkachuk but shanahan blocked this trade because he didn't want to broke core 4...

It still Dubas team or Shanahan team we saw...

We dont know whats happening and maybe it was the reason why didn't know if he was ready to come back as GM...

And if we dont know, hard to judge

 

[Buds17]

? The story is evolving

If true, I just meant that it'd be a bigger deal if any in question were still under contract and likely to be returning to the team.

 

[TMLBlueandWhite]

"I’m not going to lay on the ice like, ‘What’s going on?’ I’ll get up and play the game the way it needs to be played."
(Pietrangelo)

Pietrangelo has won a cup. He knows what it takes. Unlike anyone on this team.

At no time has playing like a coward been the path to glory.

The gutless fakers. A bunch of sissies doing sissy things. I bet they make two trips carrying the groceries in too.

We need guys that will stop a puck with their face.

Not the same chickens currently leading the team. I'm so sick of watching Tavares get punched in the face every playoffs with no response. It's time to bring in some real hockey players.

Someone that can score goals AND punch faces.

I wouldn't believe anything Shanahan says anyway. Remember, this is the same guy that told fans he was going to wait until after the playoffs to decide on Dubas' future. The same guy that promised us all a cup.

Shanahan may as well have promised the moon and the stars and the sun itself.

It doesn't matter how big, or how small, the promise. If you can't keep it, don't make it. Now he's gone and told these guys another stretch.

Whatever it takes to get Matthews to come back.

 

[thusk]

two things I find wrong with this:

1) Contract-length. If we had all of them on 8 year deals then marner and Matthews would have 4 years left and nylander would have 3. You could go for a rerun with the core with a new coach and gm. With the current contracts, this could potentially walk Matthews and nylander to FA and Marner into his last year. However they could be given extensions so this could turn into nothing, but this leads to my second issue

2) Reason. What have these guys shown to run it back? One round? Marner and Matthews had 6 games, then both went AWOL. Nylander was so inconsistent you wouldn’t know if you would get a 4th liner or the 4th best player in the league. Tavares is the worst signing in sports history. Why bring the guys back.

It took the worst goaltending performance of the playoffs for us to advance. We had to play an equivalent of an AHL goalie to even advance.

Watching florida even now, they aren’t outclassing anyone, they get by with Bob making 4-5 game saving saves and they score 2-3 goals. Carolina getting shutdown makes more sense than us, they have 2 guy on their current team who’s comparable to our big 4. One is performing in Aho, necas has been bad even before this series. This core can be stopped by a single goalie way too often.


I just don’t find any reason to run back another disappointment

Just funny so see overraction

Vs tb
Gm 1 samsonov gave up at least 4 weak game and tampa easily won it

Gm 2
Vasilevskiy gave up 2 weak goal in 1st and toronto won it easily

Gm 3 Vasilevskiy gave 2 weak goal vs 1 for Samsonov who was hot rest of the team... Toronto won by 1

Gm 4 vasilevskiy gave up 1 weak goal vs 0... leafs won by 1

Gm 5 samsonov allowed 1 weak goal vs 0... tb won by 1+empty net goal

Gm 6 both goalie was great and toronto won on a lucky bounce goal...

5 of 6 game, goalie who allowed less weak goal, his team won

Vs florida
Gm 1 samsonov gave up 2 weak goal vs 0... florida won by 2

Gm 2 samsonov gave 1 weak goal vs 0
Florida won by 1

Gm 3 woll gave up 1 weak goal vs 0
Florida won by 1

Gm 4 both goalie was great, toronto won

Both goalie gave 1 weak goal florida won

3 of 5 game the team who gave up less weak goal won and the 2 game tie was split..

I just dont understand why when oppsite G was just better than our goaltender = panic, everybody suck and we should t4ade everyone

When our g was better = we won because we played an AHL goalie level ( who still best NHL goaltender)


Maybe if samsonov didn't allowed a f***ing bad rebound for 1st goal of the game or an awful goal on montour to neutralize every chance to comeback... maybe the result would be different...

If samsonov didnt allower a trash goal to Barkov to tie the game... maybe unstead of losing 3-2, maybe its a 2-1 win...

If Woll didnt allowed weak overtime goal to reinhart, maybe leafs would won it

One thing is sure, when your foalie always allowing higher amount of weak goal, its hard to overcome this

 

[NVious]

Leafs core playoff production;

Tavares 55 22 22 44 Marner 50 10 37 47 Nylander 50 17 23 40 Matthews 50 22 22 44 Tampa: Kucherov 142 53 107 160 Point 80 40 42 82 Stamkos 123 45 50 95 Hedman 160 22 88 110 Colarado: Mack 77 44 56 100 Rant 70 30 57 87 Makar 61 16 49 65 Landeskog 69 27 40 67

Just funny so see overraction

Vs tb
Gm 1 samsonov gave up at least 4 weak game and tampa easily won it

Gm 2
Vasilevskiy gave up 2 weak goal in 1st and toronto won it easily

Gm 3 Vasilevskiy gave 2 weak goal vs 1 for Samsonov who was hot rest of the team... Toronto won by 1

Gm 4 vasilevskiy gave up 1 weak goal vs 0... leafs won by 1

Gm 5 samsonov allowed 1 weak goal vs 0... tb won by 1+empty net goal

Gm 6 both goalie was great and toronto won on a lucky bounce goal...

5 of 6 game, goalie who allowed less weak goal, his team won

Vs florida
Gm 1 samsonov gave up 2 weak goal vs 0... florida won by 2

Gm 2 samsonov gave 1 weak goal vs 0
Florida won by 1

Gm 3 woll gave up 1 weak goal vs 0
Florida won by 1

Gm 4 both goalie was great, toronto won

Both goalie gave 1 weak goal florida won

3 of 5 game the team who gave up less weak goal won and the 2 game tie was split..

I just dont understand why when oppsite G was just better than our goaltender = panic, everybody suck and we should t4ade everyone

When our g was better = we won because we played an AHL goalie level ( who still best NHL goaltender)


Maybe if samsonov didn't allowed a f***ing bad rebound for 1st goal of the game or an awful goal on montour to neutralize every chance to comeback... maybe the result would be different...

If samsonov didnt allower a trash goal to Barkov to tie the game... maybe unstead of losing 3-2, maybe its a 2-1 win...

If Woll didnt allowed weak overtime goal to reinhart, maybe leafs would won it

One thing is sure, when your foalie always allowing higher amount of weak goal, its hard to overcome this

It's been 7 years buddy, this isn't the first time this group has failed.

Now the core wants a raise AFTER their failures.