They just had greatest single season in Franchise history.
The Leafs should not move anyone for the sake of simply making moves, but there is absolutely a conversation to be had about shaking up the roster to improve the defense, goaltending, or to give the forward group a different look. There is a path to running it back and moving out other money to fill out the roster.
The secondary-scoring problem at playoff time has been this teams achilles heel. In the playoffs, the Leafs’ bottom six – which included some combination of Ilya Mikheyev, Pierre Engvall, David Kampf, Ondrej Kase, Colin Blackwell, Jason Spezza, Kyle Clifford, and Wayne Simmonds – combined for three goals, and Mikheyev scored two empty netters. Tampa Bay’s bottom six of Ross Colton, Nick Paul, Branden Hagel, Corey Perry, Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, and Patrick Maroon combined for 10 goals (no empty netters).
Against MTL, the Leafs’ bottom six contributed four goals – Jason Spezza scored three of them, and one came when he moved into the top six. Joe Thornton scored the other on the power play.
In the year before against Columbus in the play in tournament, the only bottom-six forward (in terms of time on ice) to score at all was Nick Robertson.
This has been a consistent problem for three years running under this management team, how to support the core players with better scoring options.
And yes a team lives and dies by its star players, the gap is tight come playoff time and even the top teams need every single player rolling. Case in point, Ondrej Palat (3 goals), Ross Colton (3 goals), Corey Perry (2 goals), Nick Paul (2 goals), Patrick Maroon (1 goal), Anthony Cirelli (1 goal), Brandon Hagel (1 goal), Pierre-Edouard Bellemare (1 goal). Now the Leafs, David Kämpf (2 goals), Ilya Mikheyev (2 empty net goals), Michael Bunting (1 goal), Colin Blackwell (1 goal), Alexander Kerfoot (1 goal), Wayne Simmonds (0 goals), Jason Spezza (0 goals), Ondrej Kase (0 goals), Pierre Engvall (0 goals).
The secondary core is the biggest question mark for the Leafs that NEEDs to improve.
Washington ran a core featuring Alex Ovechkin, Nik Backstrom, John Carlson, Dmitri Orlov, and Braden Holtby for six years before finally winning in year seven. The secondary core at the beginning of their window featured players such as Alex Semin, Marcus Johansson, Brooks Laich, Dennis Wideman, and Troy Brouwer. When they eventually won, the secondary group was completely replaced by Evgeny Kuznetsov, Tom Wilson, TJ Oshie, Lars Eller, and Matt Niskanen.
By the time Tampa Bay eventually broke through, the Lightning had added players like Yanni Gourde, Blake Coleman, and Barclay Goodrow, while Erik Cernak and Mikhail Sergachev matured into significant contributors. If we want to look at the Tampa Bay teams from the beginning of the decade that featured Steven Stamkos and Victor Hedman (along with players like Alex Killorn, Ondrej Palat, and Tyler Johnson) as the original core, by the time they won, Brayden Point and Alexei Vasilevskiy were developed as well. Now they just went out and added Paul and Hagel. The Leafs have yet to be able to create a third line that can really score.
This team is sooooooooo close. The three positions of need for the organization that stand out are a goalie, a top-flight defenseman, and a top 6 LW (or move JT to LW and a new C). They need to move on from Mrazek, Kerfoot, and Muzzin. Moving out those contracts will give them plenty of cap space to re-mold the roster.
Bunting Matthews Marner
Tavares Player X Nylander (D.Strome, Copp, Järnkrok)
Robertson Player X Player X (Stastny, Blackwell, Kubalik)
Engvall Kampf Player X (Aston-Reese, Steeves, Holmberg)
Rielly Player X
Sandin Brodie
Giordano Liljegren