rumman
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The price of tea in China seems like a good jumping in point……..
Trades & Free Agency Thread: Off-season Edition
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Fogelhund
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Maybe there is some material in this?
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On Robertson -> He talked with Berube, Berube told them he has opportunity... Dreger believes he will be back with the Leafs. Dreger feels that there wasn't a lot of interest in him from a trade perspective that made sense for the Leafs. Robertson's best situation since he's been with the Leafs... hole at LW.
Marner talk... nothing really new.. .interest on both sides.
Talk about Matthews being made the C.
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Americanadian
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I salute whoever sacrifices their time to listen to Dreger.
ULF_55
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Don't know why marner cannot be switched to center.
A defenseman did it at marner's age years ago.
And you can't argue he's too small.
These are just the first 16 his size.
Fogelhund
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I think the last time he played C full time was with the Don Mills Flyers. That was 12 years ago. Now that doesn't preclude him from learning the position, and he has a number of characteristics you'd like in a C. He's got decent speed, has a good 200ft game.... so that alone, you'd think it might work. It comes down to some of the other nuances, faceoffs.. he's a career 45%... but that's obviously when a C has been waived out....
I believe it does make sense to take a look at either Nylander, or Marner as a potential C though. Nylander seems like the more natural fit, though not as good defensively as Matthews. With the money each are making, you'd also hope that each could drive their own line. Having three dangerous offensive lines, could make for a tough matchup for other teams.
Torontonian
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You can say that about subtracting every teams best players. The forward group you can argue is maybe worse then years before, because there aren't the recognizable household names, but it's still solid.
The team itself is way better with Tanev/OEL and potentially Hakanpaa and Storlarz. People severely undervalue the importance of having a solid defensive core that can move the puck and defend properly. It makes the entire team better in every area of the ice.
stickty111
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Fogelhund
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This team was the second highest scoring team in the NHL last year, despite being bottom 5 in the league in goals from Dmen. That means that the forward group likely scored the most goals of any forward group in the league last year.
We lost Bertuzzi... that's it.
HockeyVirus
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Did you see his projected fantasy forward group I was replying to? He replaced Tavares with Granlund (yeah the cap dump) and Marner with a few guys who couldn't hold his jock. Our third best forward after Nylander was Knies lol
Fogelhund
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hamzarocks
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Hopefull this summer if we do move on from Tavares and Marner we can add some high-end UFAs to makw the roster more complete.
Verhaghe (best goal scorer on the team come playoffs, 75 pt winger). If he wants to come to toronto and make money we could go 7 years 49M
Sam Bennett --> was reading he may be interested to be a leaf before his career ends. The time would be know vs 4-6 years from now when he is cooked. I offer him 6M x 6 years
Adam Larsson --> RHD, mobile, can play tough minutes and is more physcal than a Tanev while being younger. 5.5M x 4
Will Borgen --> will be below 30, has multiple years as a top 4D and is RHS which are harder to find. I offer him 4.5M x 7 or 5M x 7 and let McCabe walk
Retooled roster for 2025-2026
Knies (4.5M) - Matthews (13.25M) - Domi (3.75M)
Verhaghe (7M) - Bennett (6M) - Nylander (11.5M)
Cowan (0.925M) - XXX (~4.3M on 92M cap) - Robertson (if he wants to stick around - 1.75M)
McMann (1.3M) - Kampf (2.4M) - Jarnkrok (2.2M)
Rielly - Larsson (5.5M)
Borgen (if he can play LHD - 4.5M) - Tanev (4.5M)
OEL (3.5M) - Benoit (1.3M)
Woll (3.66M)
Stolarz (2.5M)
We would need a 3C still in above scenerio
Assuming:
Knies makes 4.5M on a 7 year deal
We trade/send down Reeves + Timmins
Lilijgren sent for picks at next draft
McCabe allowed to walk due to age and risk of overpayment.
Cap in 2025-2026 assumed to be 92M
We have about 4.5M for a 3C. Ideally its not Tavares but worst case that is around max we could give him (~4M)
Verhaghe (best goal scorer on the team come playoffs, 75 pt winger). If he wants to come to toronto and make money we could go 7 years 49M
Sam Bennett --> was reading he may be interested to be a leaf before his career ends. The time would be know vs 4-6 years from now when he is cooked. I offer him 6M x 6 years
Adam Larsson --> RHD, mobile, can play tough minutes and is more physcal than a Tanev while being younger. 5.5M x 4
Will Borgen --> will be below 30, has multiple years as a top 4D and is RHS which are harder to find. I offer him 4.5M x 7 or 5M x 7 and let McCabe walk
Retooled roster for 2025-2026
Knies (4.5M) - Matthews (13.25M) - Domi (3.75M)
Verhaghe (7M) - Bennett (6M) - Nylander (11.5M)
Cowan (0.925M) - XXX (~4.3M on 92M cap) - Robertson (if he wants to stick around - 1.75M)
McMann (1.3M) - Kampf (2.4M) - Jarnkrok (2.2M)
Rielly - Larsson (5.5M)
Borgen (if he can play LHD - 4.5M) - Tanev (4.5M)
OEL (3.5M) - Benoit (1.3M)
Woll (3.66M)
Stolarz (2.5M)
We would need a 3C still in above scenerio
Assuming:
Knies makes 4.5M on a 7 year deal
We trade/send down Reeves + Timmins
Lilijgren sent for picks at next draft
McCabe allowed to walk due to age and risk of overpayment.
Cap in 2025-2026 assumed to be 92M
We have about 4.5M for a 3C. Ideally its not Tavares but worst case that is around max we could give him (~4M)
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hamzarocks
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Knies is the 5th best forward on that team
Bennett is a much better (also would be the strongest/toughest player with skill to be on the leafs since Wendel Clarke) though is our 3C for some reason instead of 2C. Also would be our best player come playoffs as he produces right around the core level while being a guy who can take out other teams players (marchand and knies)
Domi is still a better player than Knies and likely will be for the next 4 years as he continues to make chemistry with Matthews and get 50-60 pts while being a pain in the ass to play against.
Granlund is a bit worse than Tavares but not by much. Tavares is a similar cap dump just with higher AAV that no one would touch league wide. Granlund would be a 60 pt player in Toronto riding Nylanders dominance just like Tavares was. He put 60 pts in a no defense system on a trash team, he can put 60 pts in Tavares role as well
hamzarocks
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I think we could get Verhaghe + Bennett + 2 out of 3 of Chychrun/Larsson/Borgen for around 25M or 3M more than what MM and JT make rn
7M + 6M + 5M + 5M for 4 of those 5 guys totals to 23M and the team is deeper, better and has a lot more playoff potential with CV and SB being great in playoffs for 3 years now for the panthers
Granlund + Frederik + Tophichenko is a fail safe and plan B if you cant attract the other 2 guys from above listing. But ideally we can avoid that, as thosw guys wont help much come playoffs
rumman
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HockeyVirus
Woll stan.
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Debateable to say the least...
lol We've been through this, you think Bennett can play that way here? Everytime one of our guys step out of line our media launches investigations into it. Last time we had Friedman @ the DOPS on twitter for a clip. He will be like Kadri was and suspended for every slight.
As for the playoff bit, yikes. Nylander blows him out of the water in career playoff PPG. Even Marner smokes his career stats. This is completely biased revisionism because you have decided to make hating this core part of your leaf fandom.
Why in the Hell would anyone buy anything less than 3-ply toilet paper???
Honestly, this should have been Robertson’s take from the get go.
Doesn’t sound like it’s coming with good grace on his part. Rather, resignation and realization it isn’t going to happen any other way for him.
I still don’t think he’s a happy camper and that we have heard the end of this situation with him.
I can understand why he’s soured on previous management but he absolutely has an incredible opportunity to grab a hold and ring that damn bell as loud as he can. He needs to embrace it.
Fogelhund
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Interesting... we scored just as many goals 5v5 as Florida did. We just sucked on the PP (and the PK). Had the PP worked, (or more to the point, won the special teams battle) we likely win the series. Now, this is a team whose power play has been amongst the elite teams over the past 5 years. To me, PP and PK are systems, more than necessarily the players themselves... though having elite offensive talents also helps. Our PP lead the league last year for a time... and then just stopped working altogether. This falls squarely on coaching. I sure hope the new coaches get this fixed, as it will be the single most important area we need work on.
Americanadian
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Why is Florida letting Bennett and Verhaeghe walk for 13M? Given their roster construction I don't see any way they let Verhaeghe walk for less than 8.5M.
rumman
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after eight years of playoff failure you'd think we'd be beyonf IF's and BUT's as excuses...........
septic system as opposed to municipal sewage..........
hamzarocks
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1. Bennett will be able to play physical here just like Schenn was able to, like Domi/Bert can. The constant crying and conspiracy theories is pitiful from fans on here
2. Bennett has 37 pts in 54 playoff games for the panthers (last 4 playoffs) or a 56 pt pace per 82 playing 18.5 mins a game and now having played on a cup run and a cup finals run.
Nylander last 4 playoffs (didnt include 2017-2020 to make Nylander look better and make same timeline as bennett) --> 28 pts in 29 games or a 80 pt pace per 82 playing ~19 mins a game all in R1 except for 1R2 series vs the panthers
Marner last 4 playoffs has 25 pts in 25 playoff games or a 82 pt pace per 82 playing 23.5 mins a game vs R1 opponents mainly with 1R2
Nylander can conceed probably is the better player over last 4 playoff runs (not last two as Bennett has been huge part of 2 straight final/cup runs)
Marner not close. He is overplayed, force fed minutes and gets empty points with his play and value dying when we need to close out a series. Him and nylander never having to play a CF or SCF game also helps as scoring dries up further the deeper you go into the playoffs.
3. Its not hating the core, its hating their consistent failures and being the least successful "contending core" maybe ever in NA sports history. They have been paid absurdly, been hyped to lengths, getting compared against much better players, and they constantly have failed to come close to performing 8 years into this mess.
4. Tavares is beyond cooked and we saw how crap he was past playoffs with 2 pts in 7 after a horrible second half to the reg season when seperated from ~120 pt pacing nylander. Boston didnt have to shut him down, he was useless, generating very little, being a crippling player on the PP, and overall being useless vs what should have been an easy matchup vs Zacha or Coyle in the series. Granlund should be a last resort if we cant bring in Verhaghe+Bennett+Larsson+Borgen to revamp the team. Bringing back tavares at 6-7M on 3-4 year term will be the end of any chance to contend with a top 3 goalscorer of all time on this team.
It was under assumption both those guys want to come to toronto and win (Sutuer and Parise type situation)
Verhaghe also was reported to sign I swear earlier in the summee but that deal never materialized which makes me wonder if he wants to test UFA. In that roster build we have ~4.5M for a 3C. If we need to we can add 1M to each of those guys to bring them and then sign a weaker 3C for 2.5M or so.
Unlikely we get all those guys as UFA? 100%.
But I would prefer chasing that type of deeper roster build then paying Marner 12.5M and Tavares 6M and trying ti run it back unless we make a game 7 ECF run at the least this summer.
WTFMAN99
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I believe it was rumored that Verhaeghe signed but then in Puckpedia he's there...I think it was like 4-6 years around 7.14M or something near the beginning of the summer, I wonder what the hold up is?
hamzarocks
Registered User
We have lost to Boston with a 60-70% PK under multiple coaches and vs different core pieces for the bruins now
2018, 2019 and 2024 our PK was horrific.
I think 2018 are PP was great, 2019 dont recall but certain it was better than 2024 where we scored 1 PP goal on 20ish attempts
The only team our PP has worked against lately has been Tampa in the playoffs
CBJ, MTL, FLR, BOS all have shut it down pretty consistently.
The PP has player flaws
1. Marner is way to passive and isnt a threat looking to force feed passes from the point.
2. Rielly is predictable and cant really wire home from that far out, he also overpasses to MM or AM too much when there can be a shooting lane for a tip or screen
3. Tavares... he looks done on PP1. Too many times the puck was dumped to his side in an entry and he was rubbed oht on the board and it was iced down the ice..he has little finish and aim on his shot from outside the paint, and he was poor at finishing rebounds and battling in fro t of the net this year as we
Matthews and Nylander are still strong threats but both (especially matthews) get 100% fazed in big situations and prone to make dumb plays and miss quality looks that they finish come playoffs
1. We need to move Knies up for Tavares on PP1 to start things off
2. We need to change the configuartion and looks we are looking to generate from PP1. Marner needs to play bumper and be setting and dishing from that area , while also looking to be a shooting threat from closer to the net
3. Nylander amd Matthews are the main shooters with both being flexible and moving spots on PP as needed as both have best shots on the team and can beat goalies from either strong side or offside
4. Rielly may need to be moved off of PP1 for OEL if Rielly is not able to QB the PP well in playoffs early games. He needs to be making smart puck decisions and not be allergic to walking in amd getting a good shot to beat the goalie using Knies screen (he did this a lot in 2023 playoffs then stopped in 2024)
Americanadian
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hamzarocks
Registered User
Yeah which is why they may entertain leaving as they are already viewed as strong playoff players and winners.
Kind of how people here point if Mcdavid win a cup with EDM he may come to toronto (at least this was what I was reading here before Draisaitl signed)
I guess we will see if either have interest testing market and see if they can help life the near 60 year curse for our franchise
What I expect is Verhaghe gets extended back and Bennett tests UFA at the least
Yeah, I saw that too. I had basically written him off, thinking he was back in FLR for his remaining quality years. But he appears as a UFA still on all the outlets which show that info so have intrigue to see if we can sign him, uf he wants to try winning in Toronto
Fogelhund
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All things for the new coaching staff to address. But bottom line is we have Nylander, Matthews and Robertson who can shoot, Knies who should be a net front... no excuses for sucking. Same with the PK... build the right structures.
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