[Unholy_Goalie]

McDavid only 1 (meaningless) goal in the series. At least the 1 goal that Marner and Matthews scored were GWGs.

And the Leafs took them to Game 7.

But definitely blow up the team.

That’s gonna work wonders.

[Unholy_Goalie]

I read a headline that the Leafs may go after Kane and Toews.

The Toronto Retirement Community Maple Leafs.

Come retire with terrible weather, a bad playoff team, extreme taxes and insane expectations.

Tavares | Toews | Kane

Out in the 1st round. But win the Cap Savings Cup!

[Unholy_Goalie]

not to many C out there in this year UFA class. I would like the Leafs to resign him. Maybe to a 6 year contract. You know, Matthew, Nylander and all also disappeared. RIGHT!!!!
When the going get tough, Marner games disappears with Waldo. I like Marner and I hope he re-sign the same contract as Matthews did.
If Marner takes to long to decide, he may not like the remaining offers on the table as the other offers have moved on.

35 years old on a 6 year contract. That’s a legendary crack head Leafs idea from the 90s. It didn’t work then, it won’t work now.

Nylander disappeared but he’s not 35. You can afford to have one Nylander. You can’t afford to have another one which is what Tavares would be but older and more useless.

Marner did not disappear. He scored a GWG and Matthews scored a GWG in Game 6, assisted by Marner. He had 1 goal and 5 points in 7 games vs Florida. McDavid has 1 goal and 7 points in 5 games vs Florida.

Those are your facts not mine, I think Tavares had a good year. His playoffs were ok, not spectacular but ok. I get your hate for him, Aki Berg was mine from the get go.

No, they are the actual facts. I don’t hate him for no good reason. He was given his time, in his prime and now his time should be finished. He’s not the right DNA. Tavares was trash against Florida. If you want the Leafs to be able to beat them and win a Cup, Tavares won’t get you there, not even at 5 million AAV. He’s old, slow, defensively garbage and disappeared offensively.

[Unholy_Goalie]

You can spout off all you want, but the value projections are based on his value-add and 74 points in 75 games and being +19 at 5v5 grants him a lot of leeway. At the end of the day, Pacioretty-Tavares-Nylander were +3 against Florida at 5v5. The line struggled with Holmberg on the wing instead of Patches because it was like playing short-handed. Florida isn’t a team you go up against and handicap one of your top-2 lines.

Tavares is a career loser. He’s at 35 and he’s never won a damn thing in the NHL. The Leafs gave him the 2nd highest salary in the NHL, the captaincy and 7 years in his prime, with multiple young, offensive weapons. What did he do? He did fucking nothing. If this team truly wants to “change the DNA” of this team, Tavares is priority #1 to be removed from the team. Great human being but his time should be over.

If Pacioretty playing with Tavares and Nylander was the difference maker, why did Berube refuse to keep them together? Is he really that stupid? Tavares was offensively garbage against Florida. Put aside the defense for a moment but he did abso-fucking-lutely nothing offensively in 6 out of 7 games. That’s not value when his only benefit is his ability to score, especially on the PP. In the one game he did score goals, he also played terrible defensively and allowed the Panthers to come back.

Nylander did indeed disappear but we all know what he is so bringing back another defensive liability in Tavares and having two of the same is a dumbass idea. Wing or center, it won’t matter, Tavares will be like Duchene was for Dallas and ultimately a loser. I’d trade Nylander and keep Marner in a heartbeat but the Leafs are always better off keeping the guys under 30 and getting rid of the guys at 35+.

I do think the Leafs future lies in getting a #2 centre with grit and moxy and that could push JT to the wing because at 35, he’s just not going to be the long-term centre.

Agreed. Jenner and McBain should both be brought in to solve the short and long term problem at 2C and 3C. But if the goal is to move Tavares to the wing, they’d still be better off with Rielly Smith who is actually a reliable two-way winger, with better playoff results and an actual winner. Tavares is already useless, he’ll be total trash by time his deal is over if they give him a Tanev contract to bring his cap hit down.

In terms of the performance against Florida – he wasn’t good, but neither was Nylander. Objectively, despite getting some nice bounces, Pacioretty was slow and didn’t offer a ton defensively either – but it was a far sight better than Holmberg! But $5m isn’t expected to carry a line. You can be mad at Tavares because his $11m contract was never realized for the value it cost and what it may have cost the team. I’m certainly not going to hold it against him that his next contract may take some of that into financial consideration.

He didn’t provide value in his prime, he’s a fundamentally flawed player that doesn’t fit this team’s goal of beating Florida. Being a cheaper liability still makes him a liability. He’s not worth it even at the discount. He’s the wrong player with the wrong set of skills at the wrong age.

Hence the average frustration with Marner – no matter what you think of him. His value to the team was exceptional, no doubt – but it likely never crossed the $9.5m threshold on average and his play in the playoffs was all too often eclipsed by the expectations placed on him due to his exaggerated contract. When the contract was coming up, there was never any consideration from him that he could give back some of what he’d taken to the town he supposed loves so much – but rather his expectation was to seek a contract large enough to continue to cripple the organization’s flexibility. Who cares if you win as long as you get your cut of the pie? Now much of that is conjecture mixed with hyperbole but there’s enough truth in there as well that I understand why people are hoping the door hits him on the way out.

The reality is the market of Toronto burdens players like Marner with ridiculous taxes. He’d take the same amount home making 12 in Vegas as he would making 16.5 in Toronto. Framing that as greed is ignorant which makes sense why the average idiot buys that narrative. Do the math and you’ll see that even at 14, he’d be taking a discount compared to what he could make other places at 11 or 12.

Marner has more career playoff points than Nylander, Matthews and Tavares. Which games those points come in is what everybody is bitching about. And yet, Knies, Marner and Matthews were responsible for 1 GWG each against Florida. Marner was defensively sound in keeping Florida’s top line in check. He’s in his prime. He’s a 100 point, two-way winger. The media is squawking they can’t afford to keep him but the reality is they can’t afford to lose him for nothing. You won’t be able to replace him with better players at a lower cost and expect to beat Florida.

Prior to the cap no one in Toronto ever had to care if a player was overpaid. It was never a problem. But now it carries consequences.

Trade Rielly, tell Tavares to fuck off. There are other ways to save cap space. Just because some fans are too stupid to see it doesn’t mean management has to either. Hyman, Kadri, now Marner. Leafs always fuck it up.

[Unholy_Goalie]

the numbers are from
https://http://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6420056/2025/06/17/nhl-free-agency-wingers/?source=user_shared_article

Makes sense why it’s such garbage now.

Just value projections. not what they will get, some will get overpaid. some wont..

Terrible projections.

Tavares is worth 5 no problem, the difference between him and Marner is that one will cost 14 and provide 13 mil value and one will cost 5.5 and provide 8 mil value

Not worth a penny more than 2. He sucks balls in the playoffs vs. the Panthers, he sucks defensively and he’s old. If the goal is to save the most money, then Columbus would be winning the Cup every year. Facts are facts, Tavares sucks. It’s so funny though watching people call Marner a soft regular season only player yet he has more career playoff points than Tavares and played better against tougher competition. Tavares provides negative value in the playoffs. That’s the part that the idiots just can’t understand.

Nobody is running Marner out of town, hes a big boy, he can make his own decisions.he is running his own ass out of town

The media and idiots fans are definitely running him out of town, making him the scapegoat for the failures of management.

Marner wont make a difference to this team winning. time to get over it and move on

Enjoy watching Marner win a Cup somewhere else as the Leafs continue to throw away great players for nothing. Just like Kadri and Hyman, Marner will make the Leafs management and the morons who support their decisions pay for their stupidity.

[Unholy_Goalie]

41 year old Brent Burns is not a solution anymore. If you look at almost all underlying numbers on Carolina, he was being propped up by the forwards’ aggressive forecheck and by Slavin as a partner for 95% of his minutes. This year his giveaway totals doubled / 60 compared to previous years and his takeaway numbers shrunk. If you want to be good at defense, Brent Burns is not going to provide any modicum of a solution any more.

While I recognize that Florida could insulate him with a similarly heavy forecheck, I don’t think Zito wants guys he’s insulating. He wants guys who can contribute in the right system with the right style around them. Burns being a giveaway machine in his waning years is definitely not going to help with that. They’d be better off trying Klingberg. This is not a shot at who Brent Burns was – who was an exceptional top pair defenseman. It’s a commentary on his age and his reflective play this year.

Last year he had only 56 giveaways and Orlov had 36. This year, he had 104 and Orlov had 98. I think that has more to do with a change in team style or whomever is recording the stats is doing something very different. But I mostly agree that Burns playing almost 21 min night as a top pair D is no longer feasible. That’s way too much for him at this point in his career.

But he could play 16-18 minutes and provide value in Florida or in Toronto if used in the right situations, like the PP. The Panthers already replaced Ekblad with Jones. At this point, they’re looking for somebody to be on the 2nd/3rd pair. They’ve taken guys who looked “finished” like Montour and Schmidt before and turned them completely around. I’d take Burns on the 3rd pair on the PP on 1 year deal if he’s cheap.

[Unholy_Goalie]

here are some of Doms contract projections, or value.

Tavares 7.9
Bennett 6.6
Marchand 5.1
Pkane 3.5
Tanev 2.2 (his projections look terrible)
Toews 1.9
Donato 4.2

getting JT for 5 or 5.5 would be a no brainer imo.

but you could fit Marchand, Kane, Tanev and Toews for less than Marner
if those numbers were realistic

What is your source for this because they are hilariously low.

Tavares is not worth a penny more than 2 million to the Leafs. All the idiots running Marner out of town bitch about his “playoff disappearance” yet never address the issue that Tavares was offensively useless in 6 of 7 games against Florida and a constantly defensive liability in all 7 games.

Bennett is leading the playoffs in goals. There’s no chance he gets a dime less than 9 from an outside team. He’d probably take 7 or 8 in Florida because it’s a good situation.

Marchand, same as Bennett, is playing out of his mind in the Final. He’s old but a team out there looking to make a playoff run is going to throw a lot more than 5.1. No chance he joins a garbage situation like the Leafs for that price.

Patrick Kane is physically broken. He’s never healthy anymore. And he hasn’t had a good playoff run in 10 years. He’s offensively equipped to replace 60% of Marner’s offense. That price works.

Toews is going to Winnipeg and is a huge question mark after so much time away. He should be playing for the same as Pacioretty which is basically league minimum.

Tanev is overrated. Whatever he’s worth is meaningless to the Leafs. He’s only useful if he takes way less to play for his brother. Otherwise, we end up with another Kampf or Jarnkrok where the Leafs are paying way too much for a bottom-six plug.

Donato is a giant mistake waiting to happen to some stupid team. Hope it’s not the Leafs.

Nobody is going to be able to replace Marner via discounted spare parts. This team is fucked.

[Unholy_Goalie]

Right now, Florida has 8 forwards, 5 defenseman and 1 goalie for next year. Their farm system is exceptionally light – maybe Sourdif slots in for them next year. He’s an RFA but he’d likely come in under $1m.

But really they need to sign at least 3 forwards, 2 defenseman and a goalie. Because of Bob, they’ll probably go cheap in net and get a guy like Samsonov, or maybe re-run Lyon or Kahkonen. They have to resign RFA Samoskevich after a 15G, 31pt rookie campaign. Maybe $1.5 or $2m?

The big names here are Ekblad, Marchand and Bennett. If they decide to forego Ekblad, they can likely take a run at both Marchand and Bennett, resign Samoskevich, compliment the Forwards and have about $4m left to sign 2 defensemen. I’m guessing Schmidt is priced out considering he was an $800k reclamation project.

Their balance will definitely allow them to keep one of those names. If I were them I’d make it Ekblad.

I agree, I’d dump Ekblad if I were Florida and forced to do so but he could come cheaper than expected. His offensive stats were pretty bad, his positive drug test my scare off some teams and his history of concussions aren’t to be forgotten either. His best days may be behind him but he may settle to take a discount to stay in a good situation on a long term deal that keeps his cap hit low.

Then again, you could sign a guy like Burns to replace him for a fraction of the price and risk, which is what I’d hope the Leafs do to solve their missing RHD problem in the short term.

Because of the tax rate in Florida, the weather, why would any of them want to leave a guaranteed winner with a window wide open to win again? Just the same way some other players took discounts already and Tampa Bay players took discounts, it’s likely these guys see a good thing and will keep it together.

They could also move guys like Rodrigues to make space for the more important pieces which would give them 22 AAV instead of 19.

Also, remember, now that Florida is a proven winner, there will be many players happy to take less to sign there to fill those “reclamation” slots like Schmidt took up so filling up the lower end of the roster could be really cheap and easy.

[Unholy_Goalie]

it was rumored that Bennett was either offered / was to sign an extension with Florida 8×8. Marchand was rumored to be asking for 8M as well but not sure on the length of the contract.

Finding the next Wilson/Bennett/Marchand type player going to hard for the Leafs with the lack of pick in the next few years. Teams that do have them aren’t given them up unless you overpay to acquire them.

Boone Jenner and Jake McBain. The “next” ones exist. Leafs just are too stupid to acquire them. They’ll throw away 10 years of 1st round picks on all the wrong players.

Severson is only entering the third season of an eight-year, $50 million contract signed as part of a sign-and-trade from the New Jersey Devils in 2023.
Humm…. did not know this was a sign-and-trade deal.

It’s not happening for many reasons. The first being, the way Marner was treated, he’s leaving with one finger on each hand up. The next reason, he might not even want an 8 year deal. Like Matthews, he might go for 4 or 5 years. The final reason, sign and trades almost never happen. And the rare time that it did, it yielded a 3rd round pick. What the fuck are the Leafs going to do for a 3rd round pick? Either trade it for some useless plug or draft a useless plug. Either way, the Leafs are losing a 100 point, two-way, career playoff point leader for absolutely nothing.

Absolutely nobody should be surprised why this team can’t win a Cup for nearly 6 decades. Bad management, bad decisions, bad results. Garbage in, garbage out.

[Unholy_Goalie]

Watch the Leafs sign Marchand and Tavares for 3yrs @ 6.5M cap hit

It would be fantastic to have players like Bennett and Marchand on the team but they’re not leaving. And they wouldn’t come for the correct amount or the correct number of years if they did.

You have to find the next ones, which I’ve been saying for years. But those are the guys you hate to play against but love to have on your team. Like Corson, Tucker, Roberts, Markov etc. We had our era of dirty, shit disturbers too. Every single Leafs fan loved every second of it. You’d be stupid not to take those types of guys because of their “history” or “reputation”. Leafs once signed Peca even after Tucker wrecked him. They were fine.

Good to see Cujo admit that leaving Toronto was a mistake. Maybe things would have been a lot different if he had stayed. We’ll never know.

Cujo was always very overrated because he was fun to watch but not as effective as he was popular. He would make easy saves look difficult mostly because he was lost in his net most of the time. It was a romantic period where the Leafs were going deep in the playoffs but he wasn’t as good as he was popular. I remember him being sub-par (at times awful) vs the Sabres, even getting out played by a rookie Dwayne Roloson when Hasek missed games. Even with the best goalie at the time out of the game, Cujo and the Leafs still crumbled to a bunch of nobodies. When he was given the net for Team Canada, he lost it quickly for good reason and was never the best goalie of his era. And when he took off, his replacement, Ed Belfour, was the best goalie the Leafs had since expansion whom had the Leafs had in his prime, probably would have gone further. Meanwhile, Cujo crumbled behind one of the best teams ever assembled because he wasn’t capable of just being calm in his net. Maybe that was his self-admitted ego / arrogance getting the best of him but if he had stayed with Toronto, they would have been no better off.

[Unholy_Goalie]

We’re boned.

1000%.

[Unholy_Goalie]

Sabres appear to be ready to move on from Alex Tuch

To Buffalo
Robertson
Kampf/Jarncrok(or both for all I care)
Neimala/Steeves other prospect(Leafs have a number of prospects that they seem to have no use for)
4th round pick

To Toronto

Alex Tuch
2nd round pick

Tuch is a good player but acquiring Tuch will be expensive and at that price, it doesn’t help this team considering his contract situation. He’s not from Toronto and he’ll be a pending UFA. You’d basically be bringing in a guy who is a 1 year rental with little to no chance of re-signing him for cheap. To put him on the 3rd line, with 36 goals, would also not work at all. And if you put him with Matthews and he scores 40+, you have no chance of re-signing him for less than 10 million or maybe even more. The assets you would have to give up to get Tuch would stop the Leafs from being able to bring in what they really need, a 2C and a 3C who are two-way, physical, playoff style players. Those same assets should be used to acquire Jenner and McBain. You bring in two, two-way, hard hitting, 20 goal centers and the results would be way better.

Assuming the signings of Knies, Pathces and Tavares go through and Marner is gone

Try to sign Duchene/Bennet(I think Bennet contract is going to make him stupidly overpaid.

Knies Mathews Domi
McMann Duchene/Bennet Nylander
Patches Tavares Tuch
X Laughton XXXX

Fill the 4th line with big tough guys who can skate.
Patches should be load managed to get him to the playoffs healthy.. Play him every other game

Alternatively

Try to trade for the rights to Marco Rossi/Mason Mctavish

You are absolutely right about Bennett. He’s not going to sign in Toronto unless he’s stupidly overpaid. He won’t leave Florida.

That line-up is absolutely horrid defensively. Domi is not a top-line player and would force Matthews to have to work twice as hard defensively to make up for Domi.

That 2nd line, even worse defensively with Duchene than with Tavares. Don’t think Duchene scored a single 5v5 point in the playoffs this year. Tavares on the 3rd line is another disaster, especially with Pacioretty. You got two guys in their late 30s who are slow as molasses in January. Both that 2nd and 3rd line would be -10 each.

The Leafs lost against the Panthers because because their 2nd line got destroyed defensively and the Panthers 3rd line crushed the Leafs at both ends of the ice. Adding more defensive liabilities (while not subtracting the biggest defensive liabilities we had) and losing our best two-way forward for nothing is a recipe to get crushed in the 1st round again.

[Unholy_Goalie]

Tavares will sign a value contract at 3 X 5.5. Most in the hockey world will say that this is a fantastic deal for a ppg player. A few will say it is just right. 1 person will say it is a terrible contract. This person is suffering from TDS. (not the political version, Tavares Derangement Syndrome) -habtard75

Tavares is not value at 5.5 AAV. He was useless, both offensively and defensively versus Florida. He’s 34. He provides no value at that price. Tavares’ “value” is 2 million AAV to the Leafs. Take it or enjoy Buffalo.

It’s cute that some of the slower Leafs fans have turned on Marner because “100 regular season points don’t matter” but his 13 playoff points (more career playoff points than Matthews, Nylander and Tavares too) weren’t enough. But Tavares’ 7 playoff points and total disappearance vs. Florida? That’s perfectly fine because he’s taking a “discount”. Sorry, but it’s not “value” or a “discount” if the player absolutely sucks vs the Panthers and will continue to get worse as he enters his late 30s.

This has nothing to do with any kind of derangement syndrome. These are objective facts. Tavares was overpaid as a UFA to join the Leafs. He was given 7 years with the best group of players he had ever played with. Seven fucking years. He won nothing. Nothing as an individual, nothing significant as the leader of this team. If this team is to truly “change the DNA”, then Tavares is the first or second (after Rielly) that must be removed from the team if they want to succeed.

Stick to the Habs because clearly you didn’t watch enough of the Leafs to understand.

[Unholy_Goalie]

What bother me is how the team can add Marchandt, Schmidt and Johnes without spending a lot of assets.
Leafs have no picks and the pretty much the only way to improve is through overpaying in free agency.
Toronto is not preferable destination for free agents, especially when they have not much money to spend on it.
And I don’t think the Leafs had bad game 5 and 7, but rather Florida had their A game.

The Leafs are very bad at buying low and almost always buy high. They could have had Bennett years ago. They were stupid. They could have Perry too. Again, stupidity.

This is why they need to be aggressive and trade for their future players right now. Go get Jenner and McBain today so they can be your playoff warriors of tomorrow. Don’t waste money on 35+ year old losers or deadline overpayment.

[Unholy_Goalie]

Leafs won 3 games and it is a fact.
Leafs blown game 5 and 7 is a fact.
Leafs lost it when it most needed and it also the fact.
Panthers had very weak game one and two, especially Bobrovky and it also fact.
Not taking anything from Leafs, but Panthers on whole another level in playoffs and fact
that it was 7 games series does not change a lot.

I agree, the Leafs had some bad games. But they were also 1 OT goal away in Game 3 from being up 3-0. They had breakaways in OT and didn’t seal the deal.

I think Bob at 37+, will be a disadvantage for Florida that the Leafs can overcome if they keep this team together and try again with the guys under 30 and add the right grit.

[Author]

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