Confirmed Trade: [TOR/STL/MIN] O'Reilly, Acciari, Pillar to TOR; Abramov, Gaudette, ‘23 1st, ‘23 3rd, ‘24 2nd to STL; ‘25 4th to MIN

[ole ole]

Tough to hear that I know, but the Leafs have the most cap flexibility out of any team contending for a cup going forward.

Colorado says Hi

 

[TheBeastCoast]

Dont get too excited. I mean I understand they are better now but Justin Holl is still a dman on The Leafs so.......

You think Justin Holl being our 6 or 7th D-man proves your point? lol

 

[HockeyVirus]

Colorado says Hi

Leafs have 50 million in cap space in 2 seasons. They are unrivaled.

 

[JoeSakic13]

injury prone? pls explain

He keeps getting day-to-day injuries in Chel

 

[Hamilton Bulldogs]

O'Reilly is exactly the type of player the Leafs needed.

Great deal here.

 

[ole ole]

injury prone? pls explain

Sorry ...Not injury prone

Leafs have 50 million in cap space in 2 seasons. They are unrivaled.

Why not say in 3 seasons and they will have 60 mil.

 

[HockeyVirus]

With no players signed.

Hence my OP which said most cap flexibility

 

[Hobnobs]

Leafs have 50 million in cap space in 2 seasons. They are unrivaled.

Thats not how it works. Youre definitely resigning Matthews and Nylander barring any unforseen circumstances.

 

[JoeSakic13]

Thats not how it works. Youre definitely resigning Matthews and Nylander barring any unforseen circumstances.

Matthews is going to Arizona, everyone knows that.

Then Arizona is going to set the record for consecutive sellout home games.

 

[barilko05]

Matthews is going to Arizona, everyone knows that.

Then Arizona is going to set the record for consecutive sellout home games.

Pretty easy to have a sellout when all the tickets are being sold by some University student out of his door room on campus next to the arena and who's friends with the guy who runs the box office...who's also his roommate. "Dude! Score! Yah!"

 

[TimeZone]

"Your chances if (sic) playing 100+ games in the NHL being drafted in the back 10 picks of the first round are extremely low" – YOU

Here are all of the Blues picks in the 20-35 range in the cap era:

2022 – Snuggerud (you're straight up dishonest not to recognize how great this pick was)
2020 – Neighbours is 20 and has 37 games and barring injury is going to reach 100 games easy
2018 – Bokk 0 games
2017 – Thomas 292 games and counting
2017 – Kostin 84 games and counting
2016 – Thompson 276 games and counting
2016 – Kyrou 224 games and counting (a team can easily trade down from the late 20s for a pick like this)
2014 – Fabbri 320 games and counting
2014 – Barbashev 405 games and counting
2012 – Schmaltz 42 games (bad defenseman good thing they got Parayko in round 3)
2011 – Rattie 99 games (you called it! 100 games! lol ... )
2008 – McRae 15 games
2008 – Allen 384 games and counting
2007 – Perron 1027 games and counting
2006 – Berglund 717 games
2006 – Kana 6 games
2005 – Oshie 939 games and counting

The Blues higher picks than that range have been:

2006 – Erik Johnson, Cup champion and still playing, 908 games
2007 – Lars Eller, Cup champion and still playing, 925 games
2007 – Ian Cole, Cup champion and still playing, 721 games
2008 – Alex Pietrangelo, Cup champion and still playing, 925 games
2009 – David Rundblad (traded for the Tarasenko pick and played 113 games)
2010 – Jaden Schwartz, Cup champion and still playing, 643 games
2010 – Vladimir Tarasenko, Cup champion and still playing, 648 games
2021 – Zach Bolduc (one of Wheeler's current top 50)

Not only have the Blues CRUSHED the first round of the draft in the cap era, they have blown your terrible, unrelentingly dishonest argument to smithereens.

Please familiarize yourself with STL Blues draft history, here you go:

St. Louis Blues Draft History at hockeydb.com

Snuggerud -- Projects well, not a great pick until he performs in the NHL

Neighbors -- Likely gets to 200 as a bottom sixer if he can stay healthy.

Bokk - Bust.

Robert Thomas -- Stud, great pick.

Klim Kostin -- Will likely play 200 games, not a particularly good Hockey player

Tage Thompson -- Absolute stud, major outlier

Jordan Kyrou -- Great player, literally picked 35th, four picks after the first round and likely roughly 7-10 selections past where the Leafs pick will be. When I mention the first round, I do indeed mean the first round. Shall we begin including 3rd and fourth rounders next?

Fabbri -- Lots of games, unfortunately not many quality games, Fabbri has never scored more than 37 points in a season.

Ivan Barbashev -- Solid third line player, but unfortunately he doesn't fit my criteria either, as again, he was a second round draft pick.

Schmaltz -- Bust

Rattie -- Bust, borderline case as he's a first rounder today but was a second round pick at the time.

McRae -- Another second rounder, excluded.

Allen -- Solid backup, unfortunately another second rounder.

David Perron -- Quality pick.

Patrick Berglund -- Quality bottom six forward, nice pick.

Kana(who?) -- Bust.

Oshie -- Quality pick.


I find it particularly convenient you pushed the cut-off point to 35, coincidentally right where Jordan Kyrou was selected. This conveniently omitted studs like Simon Hjarlmarsson, Scott Jackson who just missed the cut-off.

I won't include them either, as again, this was a list of first rounders, not second round talent. 200(not 100) games was the floor, and while many of those players have eclipsed or likely eclipse that, you've got five quality players selected in the 20-32 range over the course of the last 18 years. Certainly well above average, but plenty of mediocre garbage in there as well.

Nobody from Toronto would be upset if the Blues selection turned into a Klim Kostin, Robby Fabbri, Dominik Bokk, Kana, Rattie, Schmaltz, Jake Neighbors.

The odds of that pick turning into a Robert Thomas, Tage Thompson or TJ oshie, are simply not very high.

 

[TimeZone]

Actually you're the one that is cherrypicking the draft range and sample size because draft boards transcend rounds. A guy selected 28th by one team could be 35th on another teams board. See McIlrath, Dylan as a prototypical example of how different teams value players differently and why having a rigid draft range is disingenuous.

And once again you are ignoring and failing to address what YOUR DATA said constituted a quality, late first round pick: 100+ NHL games played. See Pocket99s exhaustive list to show the Blues consistently beat this metric.

Stop moving the goalposts by saying it has to be a homerun pick. Your arguments are not even disingenuous anymore, they have slipped into outright dishonesty.

It's equally if not more likely a team has one or more players ranked higher than their 35th selection who was selected in the 27-34 range.

This is quite literally why we aren't discussing second round picks, the only individuals moving goal posts are the individuals listing second round and oddly enough, top 15 talent in a discussion that has been about players selected in the 20-32 from the beginning. You aren't comprehending that 200 games was simply the floor showcasing how unlikely it is to select a quality NHLer at the end of round 1.

 

[stl76]

Snuggerud -- Projects well, not a great pick until he performs in the NHL

 

[North Cole]

Imagine calling a guy with 0 NHL games a "homerun", Jake Neighbors is also far from a sure thing.

Barbashev is a second round pick, as was Kyrou.

You have roughly a 15% chance of playing 200+ NHL games in the back half of round #1.

Of all the "value" you pointed out, there's literally one player listed among late first round draft picks who actively plays on your roster.

The bold has nothing to do with the original contention you had below:

Now continue to be a good stats guy and post the likelihood of a late first round pick being a quality NHLer.

Your issue here is you're clearly cherry picking sample sizes, you have two great selections in the 20-32 range over the last decade and a half, but when we look at decades worth of data we can see league wide that the odds of selecting an impact player in this range are quite low.

Isn't grabbing a random 200+ game cut-off, also cherry picking? The issue is actually that posting "15% chance of x# of games in the league" is an irrelevant statistic because it holds no contextual value to anything. It not only assumes that all scouting departments are created equally, which they are not, but also doesn't tell us anything about the % chance that ROR will play more than 200+, or even 40+ games for the Leafs.

Maybe the Blues are totally okay with trading 30 games of ROR for 150 games of some young kid over the next four years. Maybe the Leafs win the cup after the ROR trade and both teams are more than happy. Maybe STL drafts some bust and isn't happy. Maybe the Leafs traded 150 games of some young kid for 7-14 playoff games of ROR and don't win anything and then they are unhappy.

If anyone really believed you only ever had a 15% chance of finding a half decent career player past pick 15, there's virtually no reason for any of the playoff teams to keep their first round picks every year. Anyone in playoff position should be selling to acquire rentals using that logic.

 

[TimeZone]

The bold has nothing to do with the original contention you had below:



why are you going off on people for "cherry picking" when you just pulled some random 200+ game cut-off? The issue is actually that posting "15% chance of x# of games in the league" is an irrelevant statistic because it holds no contextual value to anything. It not only assumes that all scouting departments are created equally, which they are not, but also doesn't tell us anything about the % chance that ROR will play more than 200+, or even 40+ games for the Leafs.

Maybe the Blues are totally okay with trading 30 games of ROR for 150 games of some young kid over the next four years. Maybe the Leafs win the cup after the ROR trade and both teams are more than happy. Maybe STL drafts some bust and isn't happy. Maybe the Leafs traded 150 games of some young kid for 7-14 playoff games of ROR and don't win anything and then they are unhappy.

If anyone really believed you only ever had a 15% chance of finding a half decent career player past pick 20, there's virtually no reason for any of the bottom 12 teams to keep their picks every year. Anyone in playoff position should be selling to acquire rentals using that logic.

It was literally used as a floor, and it was 200 games, not 100, that was a typo.

This article breaks down the actual odds of selecting a quality NHL player with a late first round Draft selection, as you can see, the odds aren't particularly high league wide, the Leafs currently have the 28th pick in the Draft, your odds of selecting a "fourth line or worse" player in this position are quite literally over 75%.

I think ROR is washed up garbage, but first round selections are massively overrated on this board.

Statistically Speaking: NHL Draft Pick Value - TSN.ca

 

[Menzinger]

If anyone really believed you only ever had a 15% chance of finding a half decent career player past pick 15, there's virtually no reason for any of the playoff teams to keep their first round picks every year. Anyone in playoff position should be selling to acquire rentals using that logic.

Ironically, this is probably closer to being true than not. More teams likely SHOULD be willing to move picks, and 1sts are almost certainly overrated outside of the top 15 or so picks of the draft.

 

[PocketNines]

Snuggerud -- Projects well, not a great pick until he performs in the NHL

Neighbors -- Likely gets to 200 as a bottom sixer if he can stay healthy.

Bokk - Bust.

Robert Thomas -- Stud, great pick.

Klim Kostin -- Will likely play 200 games, not a particularly good Hockey player

Tage Thompson -- Absolute stud, major outlier

Jordan Kyrou -- Great player, literally picked 35th, four picks after the first round and likely roughly 7-10 selections past where the Leafs pick will be. When I mention the first round, I do indeed mean the first round. Shall we begin including 3rd and fourth rounders next?

Fabbri -- Lots of games, unfortunately not many quality games, Fabbri has never scored more than 37 points in a season.

Ivan Barbashev -- Solid third line player, but unfortunately he doesn't fit my criteria either, as again, he was a second round draft pick.

Schmaltz -- Bust

Rattie -- Bust, borderline case as he's a first rounder today but was a second round pick at the time.

McRae -- Another second rounder, excluded.

Allen -- Solid backup, unfortunately another second rounder.

David Perron -- Quality pick.

Patrick Berglund -- Quality bottom six forward, nice pick.

Kana(who?) -- Bust.

Oshie -- Quality pick.


I find it particularly convenient you pushed the cut-off point to 35, coincidentally right where Jordan Kyrou was selected. This conveniently omitted studs like Simon Hjarlmarsson, Scott Jackson who just missed the cut-off.

I won't include them either, as again, this was a list of first rounders, not second round talent. 200(not 100) games was the floor, and while many of those players have eclipsed or likely eclipse that, you've got five quality players selected in the 20-32 range over the course of the last 18 years. Certainly well above average, but plenty of mediocre garbage in there as well.

Nobody from Toronto would be upset if the Blues selection turned into a Klim Kostin, Robby Fabbri, Dominik Bokk, Kana, Rattie, Schmaltz, Jake Neighbors.

The odds of that pick turning into a Robert Thomas, Tage Thompson or TJ oshie, are simply not very high.

Yeah, excluding #42 Dmitri Jaskin in 2011, #37 Scott Jackson 18 years ago, and #39 Simon Hjalmarsson 16 years ago is something valid you can dishonestly call out while simultaneously screaming about pick 33 Barbashev, pick 33 McRae, pick 34 Allen and pick 35 Kyrou.

Your arguments got totally destroyed here ... no accountability ... feel free to keep coming back and I will continue to walk your dishonesty around the block ...

 

[TimeZone]

Yeah, excluding #42 Dmitri Jaskin in 2011, #37 Scott Jackson 18 years ago, and #39 Simon Hjalmarsson 16 years ago is something valid you can dishonestly call out while simultaneously screaming about pick 33 Barbashev, pick 33 McRae, pick 34 Allen and pick 35 Kyrou.

Your arguments got totally destroyed here ... no accountability ... feel free to keep coming back and I will continue to walk your dishonesty around the block ...

Both met your cherry picked time frame, yet were cut off while #35, #33 second round selections were utilized in an attempt to solidify an argument, an argument that simply didn't fit the original criteria.

They're equally irrelevant when discussing first round draft selections, that was the point yet somehow it managed to completely and totally go over your head.

Would you like to begin listing 6th and 7th round talent as well to further prove your point that the Blues are good are Drafting players in the 20-32 range? I think it'd be a bold move, but it could pay off.

 

[PocketNines]

Both met your cherry picked time frame, yet were cut off while #35, #33 second round selections were utilized in an attempt to solidify an argument, an argument that simply didn't fit the original criteria.

They're equally irrelevant when discussing first round draft selections, that was the point yet somehow it managed to completely and totally go over your head.

Would you like to begin listing 6th and 7th round talent as well to further prove your point that the Blues are good are Drafting players in the 20-32 range? I think it'd be a bold move, but it could pay off.

I think what is so especially pathetic about your replies is that you can't even own your own statements that you began, because you are attributing a point to me yet you can't find me making it; you made it. Otherwise quote me. Tell me the number of the post where it was "my point" about 20-32 ... just that one measure of accountability ... or nah ...

 

[DCHabitant]

In before people overrate second round picks. Only thing of value is a late first. Cool beans.

And yet everyone's mighty glad the trade didn't include Knies, a late 2nd rounder.

 

[JTK1967]

Overal, wish we had paid less and used less retention.
This means the Leafs can make more moves, and I think this should should be their whole deadline.

 

[Donuts]

1st rd exit with less picks now

 

[Kimota]

Cannot fault the Leafs for trying. It may be Dumbass' last kick at the can. And O'Reilly brings in that leadership to the Top 6(or top 9).

 

[Channelcat]

Matthews is going to Arizona, everyone knows that.

Then Arizona is going to set the record for consecutive sellout home games.

Lol no. He is going to LA though.

 

[North Cole]

It was literally used as a floor, and it was 200 games, not 100, that was a typo.

This article breaks down the actual odds of selecting a quality NHL player with a late first round Draft selection, as you can see, the odds aren't particularly high league wide, the Leafs currently have the 28th pick in the Draft, your odds of selecting a "fourth line or worse" player in this position are quite literally over 75%.

I think ROR is washed up garbage, but first round selections are massively overrated on this board.

Statistically Speaking: NHL Draft Pick Value - TSN.ca

That's just a guideline though - even the author barely endorses the accuracy of the conclusion:

"There is not necessarily an equal gap from one rating point to the next, so this could clearly be more refined, but the simplicity is part of why this works for me".​

Each team will have a different internal value weighting for every individual pick and each team has different success rates in that pick range based on what the team is looking to acquire in the current life cycle of the team. It's a nice trivia stat, but his analysis has nothing to do with the price of tea in China.

EDM during the decade of darkness or Peter Chiarelli years where we traded for a guy like Griffin Reinhart, has objectively worse drafting capabilities than a majority of teams, but this analysis would just have you put them all in a bucket and normalize the % chance of not finding all of the busts we have managed to unearth in the first round since the 90's.

There's too many variables (analytics dept, GM turnover, meddling ownership, shitty OBC mangement, archaic coveting of size at the expense of hockey skill, etc) that can create large swings in the drafting success of any given range of picks at any given point in time. It's way to simplistic to use his calculation as a benchmark against one trade. If you really want to use his analysis because it has a "large" sample size league-wide, then we would need an analysis league wide of the other half of the trade which is - "% chance pure rental player traded for late first round pick has helped team win cup'. I would imagine that this is also not a high probability. Then the response from people will be that not all rental players are created equally and not all teams they are added to are created equally, ie - a team like Tampa adding players like Perry is not the same as previously iterations of the Leafs adding Foligno...then we are back at square one.

Ironically, this is probably closer to being true than not. More teams likely SHOULD be willing to move picks, and 1sts are almost certainly overrated outside of the top 15 or so picks of the draft.

I actually think the opposite. IMO the amount that teams overrate picks 16-32 is less than the contention gap between the 7-8 strong playoff teams and the bubble teams that happened to filter into the playoffs in a given year. I have trouble believing that a team like LA adding 3 playoff attempts with Chychrun results in a higher % chance of winning a cup, than finding an impactful player in their expected pick range with their next two firsts.