TJ Brodie is a bust

If you want to call me out on bad takes - go for it. He turns the puck over alot. A TON, actually. Brodie has had one good year and the rest are average. He isn't terrible, but he isn't a top pairing guy. He really isn't that much better than Gardiner (he used to be good, the Bruins broke him)

AS for bad takes. When have the Flames been riding his shoulders into deep playoff runs? He has been in the NHL for a decade and played in 30 playoff games. The most he played was 11 in a year.
So, I have no idea what you are talking about. You may want to do some more homework. Not the end all be all, but his player similarity scores are Alec Martinez and Justin faulk (active) Rielly similarity scores are Jones, Dumba, Myers & Hedman. So, not perfect, but decent.

The Tavares Take? Yeah - you got worse and you shouldn't have. It blew up the salary structure, and didn't help one bit with the Leafs big problem, - Defense.
If you end up moving Marner, Matthews, or Nylander for a d fine, but I'd rather have those three given age and contract. Rielly should have been the Captain. You are going to be paying him for a long, long time.

Brodie was 4th on his team in ice time for dmen

He also played 5 less minutes than Josi. That's a lot of time to turn the puck over. Slavin 3 more minutes a night. Same with the Dallas guys 3-4 more minutes a night. Also not 30.

to put Brodie in that category is not realistic. He isn't a top pairing guy. He was fourth on his own Team in Defensive Ice time.

Surely many other teams could have paid him more. He isn't worth it.

Doing nothing would have angered Leafs fans, but it would have been the right move. He doesn't move the needle.

you're right, we should've picked up chara

hey, meme take about Chara aside, I've got some time now so I dug into it. If you look at the most regularly deployed defenceman for Calgary since 2016-2017, guess who it was? Guess who had more minutes than Dougie Hamilton in LESS games between 16-17 and 17-18? Guess who also had the second most poInts out of all their defenceman since 2016-2017?

also yeah, I thought they've gone deeper in the playoffs wow, I stand corrected there. Regardless, it's a team thing, not really his fault.

Brodie is a hell of a lot better than anybody we could've replaced him with internally, and he was a home run free agent considering there was nobody else on the market

As for Tavares, you think it was a bad idea for them to pick up the 11th highest goal scoring forward since he entered the league? For free? Since becoming a leaf, there's only 9 more guys who've scored more goals than him, that number would be even smaller if he had another 40 goal year (which he didn't because of family issues, injury etc.)

The leafs got him for literally nothing, for free. The team has regressed because our coach lost the room (after psychologically abusing the players for a few years in a row), because Lou left us with garbage defence and terrible contracts that handcuffed the team, because the stars are young and inexperienced. Tavares has arguably been our playoff MVP both years he's been here, he's clutch, he never takes a shift off, he leads by example. We've lost in spite of him, not because of him.

Again - I don't think Josi, or any of the other guys you mentioned walk away for 5m a year.

Yes, Tavares was a terrible signing. I don't care he was free. He is taking cap space and driving down the value of guys around him.
17-18 - Leafs 277 goals or 3.37gpg
18-19 - Leafs 286 goals or 3.48gpg
19-20 - Leafs 238 goals or 3.40gpg (70games)

It didn't change your offense. I would argue, you are are two line team now. Most good teams can stop that. You are very top heavy.

You also neglect to mention where Kadri is in scoring or should I say the difference between him and Tavares. Is that worth 6m? That is a legit Dman or two more solid forwards (Kerfoot Stinks). Joe Thornton is done, Simmonds is done, Spezza isn't getting better.

If you really wanted to get Tavares, I get that, but not at 11m and not without moving one of 88, 16 or 34. Kadri was not the guy to move coming off a bad year and a bad playoff.

this team does not scare me.

In 18-19 the leafs basically only had nylander for 35 games, he came back after an extended pause and it took him 15-20 games to even remotely get back to form. Even then, Babs buried him on the 3rd line because he didn't like him. The team would scored even better if he had his usual 20-30 goals

As for this year, the team was hot garbage under babs, one of the lowest scoring teams in the NHL. If you count only the 48 games after Babs was gone, the leafs scored at a 287 goal pace, higher than 17-18 and 18-19, and had 3.51 goals per game

Also, Kerfoot doesn't stink lmao. He's a good player. He came in, the team stunk, coach didn't like him, he broke his jaw, had surgery, missed games, played anyways with a cage on while eating out of a straw. This year was a disaster for him and he still put up solid defensive numbers and had about 30 points. Thornton is good for 30-35 points, Simmonds is healthier than he's been in years and he's only 32, no reason to expect he doesn't produce at a decent 3rd line level, Spezza is a question mark though.

Btw, you neglect to mention that that 17-18 team featured Marleau (who promptly dropped off a cliff in scoring), Bozak, JVR, Komarov, and Kadri who really only put up those 30 goals playing with Marner

Had we kept those players, we'd be spending about $22M to get less goals. We let all those guys walk or we got rid of them etc. (except marleau and kadri who promptly regressed hard anyways) and made up the difference with Tavares at 11M

So we basically saved $11M and kept our scoring the same, or even technically got better because, as the goals show, we scored more

A team without Tavares, with JVR, Bozak, Kadri, etc. would see the leafs have LESS cap space AND less scoring. Unless you make the argument we could've let all those guys walk and NOT signed tavares, in which case we wouldn't have had a team OR scoring lol

But I thought Josh Leivo and Jeremy Bracco were top six players?

You did good to walk away from JVR and Bozak.

Perron would have been a good signing. He is good defensively and has that Pain the arse thing.
Hyman Matthews Marner
Perron Kadri Nylander
Kapanen ? Johnsson

You could have been more than fine with Riley nash or Derek Ryan - some D minded 3c. Probably could have even overpaid for a Statsny or Joe Thornton on a 1 year deal (a couple years ago) if you were that worried.

It's not only that he blew up the pay structure - do you think Rielly is going to take a team friendly deal when guys who have won nothing and just walk through the door get 11m? There is a reason Matthews got 11.6 and Marner almost didn't play.

Also - if not for Tavares 11m contract, the Leafs probably don't need to ditch Marleau and end up with the 13th overall pick. Maybe higher if you really think Tavares made them better.

When Matthews wanted more than Tavares, you should have moved him for Seth Jones or something. It seems like an identity crisis of a team. Like it's really Matthews and Marner's team, but all of the sudden mr lame bot comes in and now it's his team.

idk man, that's a lot of speculation at this point. Tavares walked onto the team, scored 47 goals, led the team to the playoffs, was our best player

Matthews was getting 11.6 no matter what lol. He wanted McDavid money (16.67% of the cap for 8 years) which was about $13.5.

Matthews: 212GP | 111G 94A 205P | 18min per game total
McDavid: 209GP | 87G 169A 256P | 21min per game total

Matthews: 212GP | 83G 60A 143P | 15min per game 5v5
McDavid: 209GP | 67G 106A 173P | 16.4min per game 5v5

worth noting he has 104 more blocks, same number of takeaways, more giveaways, same hits. Not completely absurdly out of the question that he should get within the same dimension of McDavid. He's certainly a way better goal scorer

Also lmao, moving Matthews would be hilariously awful. He's gonna (if he isn't already) become the best goal scorer in the entire league. You can't trade him and get better

He isn't the best goal scorer in the league. (Ovi or Pastrnak) McDavid is better all around, by a lot. Matthew is great.
One is a captain and one is mooning women on nights out with his buddies. Yes, I know he is young and dumb. McDavid isn't doing that. There is a reason you needed to add a leader for an additional 11m.

Matthews deserved to get paid, but not that much. He should have been 9.5-10.5. He got 1.5 too much.

How can Matthews be as good as McDavid, but Tavares led the leafs to playoffs? Especially when they didn't go any further with him than without him.

I am trying to be unbiased here. Matthews is Elite and probably a top 5 Center (McDavid, McKinnon, Draisiatl, EIchel, Matthews) - Probably in that order. Hard to tell with Eichel, because Buffalo is awful. I would also probably take Barkov over Matthews too. Peterson is real close too. Like you said, there is an attitude or drive issue with the leafs. That generally comes from the best players. I didn't include the The SId, Kopitars, Malkins - Guys over 27.

It's kind of hard to take a shift off when you see a player of Matthews skill pushing as hard as he can every second. When Connor Brown does it, nobody cares. I don't see it from Matthews. He disappears for stretches (Pastrnak does too, but the Bergeron doesn't).

Nylander trade is the obvious move, although his return is not in the same realm as Matthews. You could get better and trade matthews. Easily. You can't do a Bruins - Seguin type deal though. I am wondering if you offered Matthews to say CBJ in the offseason you signed Tavares, you could have landed Dubois and Werenski or a combination of Dubois, Savard and Anderson.

Still pretty solid with Tavares, DuBois and Kadri down the middle. Especially if you add a top 9 winger and a top pairing D. Again, all speculation, but Defense and depth is now your Achilles heel. That being said, I looked at Tampa's d and didn't think they could get it done. You also don't have Hedman, and I am sure you can agree that Luke Schenn will never play that well again and there is about a 2% chance Bogosian actually stays healthy for another 20 game stretch.