Trades and Free Agency Discussion - The Dog Days of Summer

[Sypher04]

Seeing that contract Pius Suter signed with Vancouver makes me dislike the Kampf deal even more. He’s simply not the kind of player you can overpay by nearly a million dollars and get value out of. I like the player and get we got more term, but clearly a bad deal imo. He should be a 4C and he’s making way too much money for that now

 

[Captain Crunch]

Can't speak for previous years as nothing was said, but according to some insiders after Toronto was eliminated, they hinted at there being a rift in the dressing room because of the fact it's always been about the Core 4 and not about the team. (Believe it was said on the Leaf Report podcast).

Treliving alluded to it as well when he first hired about it not being about the Core 4, but about the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Which kind of makes sense why Toronto brought in Reaves to try to bring the team together, it's really odd for a team on the road not to go for dinner IMO, I think you need to be willing to lay it all on the line for each other if you want to win. The Maple Leafs to this date have not shown they are willing to lay it on the line for each other. (As shown with no show efforts in elimination games and playoff games, and not starting on time a majority of the time).

Could not agree more! Perfectly said!

 

[Sypher04]

Can't speak for previous years as nothing was said, but according to some insiders after Toronto was eliminated, they hinted at there being a rift in the dressing room because of the fact it's always been about the Core 4 and not about the team. (Believe it was said on the Leaf Report podcast).

Treliving alluded to it as well when he first hired about it not being about the Core 4, but about the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Which kind of makes sense why Toronto brought in Reaves to try to bring the team together, it's really odd for a team on the road not to go for dinner IMO, I think you need to be willing to lay it all on the line for each other if you want to win. The Maple Leafs to this date have not shown they are willing to lay it on the line for each other. (As shown with no show efforts in elimination games and playoff games, and not starting on time a majority of the time).

That doesn’t really make sense. It’s the media that makes it all about the core 4, why would that be the cause of a rift in the room. And don’t tell me it’s the contracts as most of these guys weren’t here when the core signed their deals. They knew what they signed up for

 

[Sypher04]

Wow, you’re one of those insiders Dekes was talking about. Lol

Where did I claim insider knowledge? I’m more commenting on how little credibility Feschuk has and that he’s not a respected hockey reporter. He’s been perfectly willing to overstep or fill in blanks with his own opinions to sensationalize or even outright fabricate a story.

 

[TMLBlueandWhite]

NHL free agency reminds me of a thrift store auction.

You're bidding on players other teams no longer want. They're all old, overpriced, and not in best shape. You never get what you pay for.

The big name offseason acquistions, Bertuzzi and Domi.

Those guys were signed for their name more than anything. Something else fans can hope for. That these guys play like their dads.

The fans can see the four forward experiment isn't working.

Yet the media continue to find new ways to sell this team as a contender. Preying on a desperate fan base. The greatest hope in sports is that some kid with a recognizable name will pay off better than his old man.

Grasping for bygone glory.

Tying the dead corpse of the past, mouth to mouth, to the living present.

 

[Captain Crunch]

Where did I claim insider knowledge? I’m more commenting on how little credibility Feschuk has and that he’s not a respected hockey reporter. He’s been perfectly willing to overstep or fill in blanks with his own opinions to sensationalize or even outright fabricate a story.

The proof is in the pudding. It is so obvious that this team is not a “team”, and that’s on this core! Why should management have to keep bringing in players to help bring this team together (say hello to Ryan Reaves, among others)? Shouldn’t the core be doing those things? There have been zero signs that they are doing those types of things. In fact, most if not all signs point to the exact opposite!

Would you not agree that the Leafs could benefit by improving the defence as well as the bottom six (and please don’t tell me that every team would, we are specifically talking about the Leafs here)? There is no cap room available, thanks to Matthews and Marner, and the signing of Tavares in which management (ultimately Shanahan) also plays a part. Would it not benefit the team, and show a lot to their teammates, if they took a hometown discount on their next contracts (and I do realize Marner’s won’t be until next year)? Would that not show the rest of the team that they are truly invested in this team and want to do whatever they can to help this team win?

I am so sick and tired of hearing SOME posters on here saying how they “deserve” to get paid! It would be such a welcome change to see them put the team ahead of their own selfish wants. In my mind, if Matthews wanted to do that, he would have already signed, which in turn would have caused/maybe forced Nylander to lower his asking price. I could put my trust back into these players if that were to happen, even though their inability to put this team on their backs in the playoffs has not even been close so far in 5-7 years!

 

[Dekes For Days]

Dont care about dinners.. but this team doesnt play as a tight group all for one as we are conventionally used to

There's nothing in their play or anything else that indicates they're any less tight than any other team, or have any less of an "all for one" mentality.

Maybe you remember this:

And maybe there’s a secret nod to be given to a pair of team dinners on the town in Tampa, an initiative spearheaded in large part by defenceman Luke Schenn. Upon arriving in Toronto for his second go-round with the Maple Leafs ahead of the March 3 trade deadline, Schenn said he was somewhat appalled to hear how, in previous Toronto playoff runs, the Maple Leafs had mostly stuck to what he considered a regrettable road trip habit.

I don't see any direct quote from Schenn there. I see a guy taking some creative liberties with paraphrasing to try and craft a story.
But even if Schenn said it, who cares. What works for Schenn, and what may have worked in certain instances for Tampa, is not necessarily what works for every other team.
I'm not really sure how Schenn and Tampa were supposedly having full team road dinners during a global pandemic in the first place.

It would be great to keep all of them, if they all weren’t so greedy.

They're not greedy, so yes, it would be great to keep all of them.

 

[Sypher04]

The proof is in the pudding. It is so obvious that this team is not a “team”, and that’s on this core! Why should management have to keep bringing in players to help bring this team together (say hello to Ryan Reaves, among others)? Shouldn’t the core be doing those things? There have been zero signs that they are doing those types of things. In fact, most if not all signs point to the exact opposite!

Would you not agree that the Leafs could benefit by improving the defence as well as the bottom six (and please don’t tell me that every team would, we are specifically talking about the Leafs here)? There is no cap room available, thanks to Matthews and Marner, and the signing of Tavares in which management (ultimately Shanahan) also plays a part. Would it not benefit the team, and show a lot to their teammates, if they took a hometown discount on their next contracts (and I do realize Marner’s won’t be until next year)? Would that not show the rest of the team that they are truly invested in this team and want to do whatever they can to help this team win?

I am so sick and tired of hearing SOME posters on here saying how they “deserve” to get paid! It would be such a welcome change to see them put the team ahead of their own selfish wants. In my mind, if Matthews wanted to do that, he would have already signed, which in turn would have caused/maybe forced Nylander to lower his asking price. I could put my trust back into these players if that were to happen, even though their inability to put this team on their backs in the playoffs has not even been close so far in 5-7 years!

Obviously everyone always likes upgrades. I think the bottom 6 should be totally fine if both Knies and Robertson can stick. Though I’d still like one more center personally. The D needs work.

Matthews not having signed yet is not meaningful in trying to draw conclusions as you’re doing. By all accounts MacKinnon took less money, willingly gave up all the years in term because he’s a good team guy and it STILL took until training camp to get it done. Nobody seems to think Pastrnak’s deal is anything other than good and it took until March. People need to stop reading into things. When they are ready they’ll announce an extension or they won’t. We can assess at that time whether Matthews did right by the team or not.

 

[Dekes For Days]

Would you not agree that the Leafs could benefit by improving the defence as well as the bottom six (and please don’t tell me that every team would, we are specifically talking about the Leafs here)? There is no cap room available, thanks to Matthews and Marner, and the signing of Tavares in which management (ultimately Shanahan) also plays a part.

Of course the Leafs could benefit from improving parts of their team. Every team would. But you wouldn't just be improving parts of your team. You'd be trying to improve parts of your team by sacrificing another massive part of your team, and when the part you're sacrificing benefits the team more than the collective improvements you'd be making elsewhere, then that net impact is not beneficial to the team. It's opening a massive hole to try and patch tiny ones.

When you no longer have the top pieces, you really have no way to get it back. When you don't have bottom of the lineup depth pieces, there are still options.
You don't need to throw money at things like the bottom six or goaltending to improve it. That's how you get cap anchors and people performing below their cap hit.
You just need to choose the right cap efficient pieces that are out there and available, and have an internal pipeline to add pieces like Knies, Robertson, Woll, etc.

Would it not benefit the team, and show a lot to their teammates, if they took a hometown discount on their next contracts (and I do realize Marner’s won’t be until next year)? Would that not show the rest of the team that they are truly invested in this team and want to do whatever they can to help this team win?

Obviously, it's beneficial to the team and a show of team dedication to take a discount on top of the discount top players inherently give in this league.
Obviously, taking some big rare discount and being paid according to a different standard than everybody else is not a reasonable thing to demand out of your players, and it's far from the only way to be dedicated to the team.

 

[Captain Crunch]

Obviously everyone always likes upgrades. I think the bottom 6 should be totally fine if both Knies and Robertson can stick. Though I’d still like one more center personally. The D needs work.

Matthews not having signed yet is not meaningful in trying to draw conclusions as you’re doing. By all accounts MacKinnon took less money, willingly gave up all the years in term because he’s a good team guy and it STILL took until training camp to get it done. Nobody seems to think Pastrnak’s deal is anything other than good and it took until March. People need to stop reading into things. When they are ready they’ll announce an extension or they won’t. We can assess at that time whether Matthews did right by the team or not.

So you’re saying Robertson playing 8-10 minutes, on average, will help both the team and himself? I cannot see that being beneficial to either one.

You're right, we can’t make any judgement yet until Matthews signs. I just find it odd that by him not signing yet, Nylander is refusing to sign. And I’m not saying Nylander is worth $10 million, to me he’s worth $9 million at the most. Also, why should he take any kind of discount if Matthews and Marner won’t. This will be very interesting to see how it all unfolds.

 

[Captain Crunch]

Of course the Leafs could benefit from improving parts of their team. Every team would. But you wouldn't just be improving parts of your team. You'd be trying to improve parts of your team by sacrificing another massive part of your team, and when the part you're sacrificing benefits the team more than the collective improvements you'd be making elsewhere, then that net impact is not beneficial to the team. It's opening a massive hole to try and patch tiny ones.

When you no longer have the top pieces, you really have no way to get it back. When you don't have bottom of the lineup depth pieces, there are still options.
You don't need to throw money at things like the bottom six or goaltending to improve it. That's how you get cap anchors and people performing below their cap hit.
You just need to choose the right cap efficient pieces that are out there and available, and have an internal pipeline to add pieces like Knies, Robertson, Woll, etc.

Obviously, it's beneficial to the team and a show of team dedication to take a discount on top of the discount top players inherently give in this league.
Obviously, taking some big rare discount and being paid according to a different standard than everybody else is not a reasonable thing to demand out of your players, and it's far from the only way to be dedicated to the team.

By sacrificing another massive part of your team that cannot lead, cannot put the team on his back, disappears at crucial times in the playoffs, not to mention being able have all the players believe they are part of the team? I’d certainly be willing to risk that.

Yes, we have to do that because of the overpayment on Matthews and Marner, as well as for signing Tavares. That’s called bargain bin shopping, or scraping the bottom of the barrel. How has that worked out so far?

It seems like you’re contradicting yourself there. You say top players inherently give discounts, then you say it’s rare. Which is it?

 

[Captain Crunch]

Except Red. Red was the only guilty man in Shawshank.

Brilliant observation. Lol

 

[Tufted Titmouse]

NHL free agency reminds me of a thrift store auction.

You're bidding on players other teams no longer want. They're all old, overpriced, and not in best shape. You never get what you pay for.

The big name offseason acquistions, Bertuzzi and Domi.

Those guys were signed for their name more than anything. Something else fans can hope for. That these guys play like their dads.

The fans can see the four forward experiment isn't working.

Yet the media continue to find new ways to sell this team as a contender. Preying on a desperate fan base. The greatest hope in sports is that some kid with a recognizable name will pay off better than his old man.

Grasping for bygone glory.

Tying the dead corpse of the past, mouth to mouth, to the living present.

One of the worst posts I've seen all summer, bravo

 

[Gilmour1996]

Maybe you remember this:

And maybe there’s a secret nod to be given to a pair of team dinners on the town in Tampa, an initiative spearheaded in large part by defenceman Luke Schenn. Upon arriving in Toronto for his second go-round with the Maple Leafs ahead of the March 3 trade deadline, Schenn said he was somewhat appalled to hear how, in previous Toronto playoff runs, the Maple Leafs had mostly stuck to what he considered a regrettable road trip habit.

Maybe they tried that and found that the "big money men" all sat at the head of the table and silently immersed themselves into their devices leaving the rest of the team wondering why they call this a team dinner.

 

[Tufted Titmouse]

Maybe they tried that and found that the "big money men" all sat at the head of the table and silently immersed themselves into their devices leaving the rest of the team wondering why they call this a team dinner.

Just an incredible amount of speculation lol. Mitch Marner and William Nylander are social butterflies.

There are enough performance related reasons to bag on these guys, absolutely no reason to create fantasy rage bait.

 

[justashadowof]

A fantasy scenario for 2023-24 is a healthy matured Nick Robertson playing on a 3rd line with proven playmaker Max Domi giving the Leafs a legitimate 3rd scoring line for the opposition to deal with.

 

[Duffman955]

Some of the posts here are crazy as hell. I don't know what yall watching.

Anyways:

- Matthews signing for 13.5 for x number if years is the idea here?

- Nylander wants 10mil, leafs want 8mil. Seems like splitting the difference is the way to go. 9mil is fair?

- Defense looks incomplete. No partner for Rielly at the moment. Really would have liked to keep Schenn. Nylander may be traded for someone who can take that spot.

 

[SprDaVE]

Some of the posts here are crazy as hell. I don't know what yall watching.

Anyways:

- Matthews signing for 13.5 for x number if years is the idea here?

- Nylander wants 10mil, leafs want 8mil. Seems like splitting the difference is the way to go. 9mil is fair?

- Defense looks incomplete. No partner for Rielly at the moment. Really would have liked to keep Schenn. Nylander may be traded for someone who can take that spot.

The bare minimum would be 5 years. Anything lower in term is awful to me for that AAV.

Nylander at 9M with max term is the max the Leafs can probably go. If the demands are higher than that and with no chance of budging, they definitely need to explore a trade and replenish the depth with cheaper/younger options. I love Nylander a lot but at some point, something has to give here.

The defense is kind of weird but it's probably OK. It's pretty much the same to last years defense but with Klingberg instead of Sandin, and McCabe instead of Holl (Muzzin played 4 games). It's always weird to me when people point to the Leafs defense as negative when it was probably their bigger strength last year, especially in the post-season. They struggled a lot more offensively.

We're mid August and zero news with any of the pressing matters. I hope Treliving doesn't repeat a big mistake he made previously.

 

[Dekes For Days]

By sacrificing another massive part of your team that cannot lead, cannot put the team on his back, disappears at crucial times in the playoffs, not to mention being able have all the players believe they are part of the team?

By sacrificing a massive part of the team that leads, puts the team on their back, shows up at critical times in the playoffs, and makes all players feel like an important part of the team. But way more importantly, sacrificing somebody who is much more likely to provide surplus value and net positive impact for that cap space than the collective group you put together to replace them.

Yes, we have to do that because of the overpayment on Matthews and Marner, as well as for signing Tavares. That’s called bargain bin shopping, or scraping the bottom of the barrel. How has that worked out so far?

Every good team out there has to do that. That's just a function of the hard cap. You can't just go out there and buy A+s in everything. You have to have priorities and find cap efficiencies. Having cap efficient depth doesn't mean "scraping the bottom of the barrel", and it's actually worked out quite well. We managed to find a lot of quality cap efficient depth over the years, even without much of the other half of the equation I mentioned - an internal pipeline providing cap efficient ELCs.

The impact that Bunting brings was determined to be worth 4.5m by a competitive team this offseason. If we had been paying him 4.5m this whole time instead of 950k, is anything different? Is our depth better because we paid him more instead of "scraping him off the barrel"?

The impact that Mikyehev brought was determined to be worth 4.75m. If we had been paying him 4.75m that whole time instead of 925k and then 1.65m, is anything different? Is our depth better?

If we pay Samsonov 3.55m instead of 1.8m, is our goaltending better?
If we pay O'Rielly 4.5m instead of 1.9m, is our depth better?
If we pay Acciari 2m instead of 1.25m, is our depth better?
If we pay Schenn 2.75m instead of 850k, is our defense better?
Is Kampf a better player and "quality depth" now that we're paying him more?

Take a look at the players that played for us in the playoffs last year and then signed new contracts this offseason.
We didn't have bad depth and pieces beyond the core. We just spent 14.5m on pieces that, on the market, would have cost 27.4m.

It seems like you’re contradicting yourself there. You say top players inherently give discounts, then you say it’s rare. Which is it?

It's not contradictory at all. It's just two different definitions of "discounts".
Top players in this league bring more impact to teams on and off the ice than what market value has historically assigned to them.
Relative to their impact, top player contracts in this league are inherently "discounted" to pump up the middle class contracts in this league.
"Discounts" relative to where market value has landed for top players however (what most people are talking about when discussing discounts) are extremely rare.

 

[Dekes For Days]

Yikes. Montreal retains another 50% on Petry, and can still only extract Lindstrum and a late 2025 4th.

 

[Duffman955]

The bare minimum would be 5 years. Anything lower in term is awful to me for that AAV.

Nylander at 9M with max term is the max the Leafs can probably go. If the demands are higher than that and with no chance of budging, they definitely need to explore a trade and replenish the depth with cheaper/younger options. I love Nylander a lot but at some point, something has to give here.

The defense is kind of weird but it's probably OK. It's pretty much the same to last years defense but with Klingberg instead of Sandin, and McCabe instead of Holl (Muzzin played 4 games). It's always weird to me when people point to the Leafs defense as negative when it was probably their bigger strength last year, especially in the post-season. They struggled a lot more offensively.

We're mid August and zero news with any of the pressing matters. I hope Treliving doesn't repeat a big mistake he made previously.

Don't underestimate the impact of losing Schenn.

Not only was he super solid, he brought the best out of Rielly

 

[Captain Crunch]

By sacrificing a massive part of the team that leads, puts the team on their back, shows up at critical times in the playoffs, and makes all players feel like an important part of the team. But way more importantly, sacrificing somebody who is much more likely to provide surplus value and net positive impact for that cap space than the collective group you put together to replace them.

Every good team out there has to do that. That's just a function of the hard cap. You can't just go out there and buy A+s in everything. You have to have priorities and find cap efficiencies. Having cap efficient depth doesn't mean "scraping the bottom of the barrel", and it's actually worked out quite well. We managed to find a lot of quality cap efficient depth over the years, even without much of the other half of the equation I mentioned - an internal pipeline providing cap efficient ELCs.

The impact that Bunting brings was determined to be worth 4.5m by a competitive team this offseason. If we had been paying him 4.5m this whole time instead of 950k, is anything different? Is our depth better because we paid him more instead of "scraping him off the barrel"?

The impact that Mikyehev brought was determined to be worth 4.75m. If we had been paying him 4.75m that whole time instead of 925k and then 1.65m, is anything different? Is our depth better?

If we pay Samsonov 3.55m instead of 1.8m, is our goaltending better?
If we pay O'Rielly 4.5m instead of 1.9m, is our depth better?
If we pay Acciari 2m instead of 1.25m, is our depth better?
If we pay Schenn 2.75m instead of 850k, is our defense better?
Is Kampf a better player and "quality depth" now that we're paying him more?

Take a look at the players that played for us in the playoffs last year and then signed new contracts this offseason.
We didn't have bad depth and pieces beyond the core. We just spent 14.5m on pieces that, on the market, would have cost 27.4m.

It's not contradictory at all. It's just two different definitions of "discounts".
Top players in this league bring more impact to teams on and off the ice than what market value has historically assigned to them.
Relative to their impact, top player contracts in this league are inherently "discounted" to pump up the middle class contracts in this league.
"Discounts" relative to where market value has landed for top players however (what most people are talking about when discussing discounts) are extremely rare.

So if that’s the case, I guess that puts the onus back on the core players then, right?

 

[Captain Crunch]

Some of the posts here are crazy as hell. I don't know what yall watching.

Anyways:

- Matthews signing for 13.5 for x number if years is the idea here?

- Nylander wants 10mil, leafs want 8mil. Seems like splitting the difference is the way to go. 9mil is fair?

- Defense looks incomplete. No partner for Rielly at the moment. Really would have liked to keep Schenn. Nylander may be traded for someone who can take that spot.

It would be a big boost if Liljegren could take that big step and be Rielly’s partner. Probably still a year or so away.

 

[LeafSteel]

It would be a big boost if Liljegren could take that big step and be Rielly’s partner. Probably still a year or so fired Keefe away.

Fixed it for you…

Still hoping we see a move for Peeke, and either move Brodie for cap space and picks ideally, or move him to LHD so that Gio is not counted on to play every day.

Brodie makes an expensive 3rd pairing, but he’d thrive there and would make a very steady partner for young guys like Liljegren and Timmins, whom I would like to see both get more development opportunities in our lineup,

 

[andora]

Fixed it for you…

Still hoping we see a move for Peeke, and either move Brodie for cap space and picks ideally, or move him to LHD so that Gio is not counted on to play every day.

Brodie makes an expensive 3rd pairing, but he’d thrive there and would make a very steady partner for young guys like Liljegren and Timmins, whom I would like to see both get more development opportunities in our lineup,

I wanted to clarify my laughing was at your fixed it for you

Other than that agreed with your thoughts whole heartedly