Lead to a goal 🤷

But the ice time's for Keefe are becoming a real problem. The third line looked better than the first line at times yet u play them the equivalent to 4thline mins

Needs to give them more as there may have been more chances for goals for them

Paul MacLean hit the nail on the head. The mentality these guys adopt is plaguing our team. This once again harkens back to the idea of identity, and how the Leafs have let the rhetoric of them being losers to control them. On paper, we have a very good team in my opinion. Bunting, Matthews, and Marner is a proven line that was highly effective last season. Robertson, Tavares, and Nylander is a great scoring line with speedy wingers and a hard working centerman. Engvall, Kerfoot, Jarnkrok should be a dominant two way line with lots of speed. Aston-Reese, Kampf, and Aube-Kubel should be a defensive powerhouse. The issue in my opinion is not the roster construction, but instead that god awful mentality. Keefe simply cannot get the guys to shake it. They go out there and become exactly what everyone thinks they are. I'm a big believer in this team, but they need to get it in gear and roll.

Also, Kallgren is becoming a non-option

Other than the Kulikov goal I dont blame Kallgren for any of those others. Marner's careless passing lead to 2 easy goals for Anaheim and in OT its the wild west for whose gonna win it. As in general no goalie is winning with this effort. Sammy stood on his head and we last back to back games against the Kings and Knights

If Leafs want to win they need to get themselves under control and conquor this random demon they have encountered. As Matthews is playing worse than he did with his wrist injury and Marner is making weird questionable passes. Only bright spot Tavares

Paul Mac is right they need to figure things out but then his other tweets make him look foolish. As did he not remember Gibson does not want to be traded

Maybe I should have chosen better words for that haha. What I meant to say was that I think it is less than ideal to rely on Kallgren as backup for an extended period of time. We saw it last year and while he was decent, it is not perfect. Definitely did not mean to insinuate that he is unplayable

Teams in general have 3 goalies for a reason and often they dont do great. Murray's back in November so that will help things. But this is an issue not with the goaltending but with the forwards and D as when they in their own zone they cant seem to either make a play, clear the puck, or protect their goalie.

I got a feeling changes are coming as to what 0 idea but goaltending isnt one thats needed rn

This might be the worst collection of bottom 6 FWDs they’ve had, especially at driving play.

Usually I'm a big statistics guy, but I think that the information presented here is more of a reflection of roster-wide poor play as opposed to the bottom 6 being bad in general. Comparing Han's graph of attackers this year compared to last, you'll notice everyone has regressed, regardless of their spot in the roster. While Han is correct in stating that the deployment of the bottom six and the tactics they are utilizing are more detrimental to the teams lack of success than the effort of the star players (although seeing the top 6 give more effort would help), the stats are representative of a much smaller sample size during a notoriously bad month for the Leafs. Its annoying that October starts are always this bad, and while success beyond October is not guaranteed, I think it is likely. The only major departures from the bottom 6 are Mikheyev and Kase, both of whom were suitably replaced by Jarnkrok and Kerfoot. If we can get it into gear, there is no doubt in my mind that the bottom six will perform very well. They need to shake the demons that plague them and just play hockey. Forget the media, forget the losing, forget it all. Most of the bottom 6 remains the same (Kampf, Engvall, Kerfoot), so we know they have what it takes, at this point it's just figuring it out

Absolutely, very small sample size, but Kerfoot is not producing any offence if he is not stapled beside Tavares and Nylander. He absolutely should have been traded last year when his value was sky high riding an incredible unsustainable PDO.

Engvall scoring 15 goals was an aboration highlighting by having incredible chemistry with Kampf and Mikheyev (no longer here. He absolutely should not have been resigned.

Zach Aston-Reese and Nicolas Aube-Kubel both two great defensive players, do not bring any type of offence that Spezza had and there styles of play do not fit (Aube-Kubel especially) with how the Leafs (Keefe) likes to play.

Jarnkrok


He needed that goal badly, but has been invisible (that’s in Keefe also) to put him in better positions to succeed but again another player that’s a dime a dozen in the bottom six. Great defensively but no offence at all.

I was so high on getting Kubalik/Strome/Perron/Niederreiter those are the types of additions this team needed in the offseason or by trade. They NEED players who can create and score ESPECIALLY when the core guys are struggling. This has been a running issue from the CLB, MTL, and TBL series, no secondary help.

Edit:

Also not moving Muzzin when it was so clear he was done and trading for another injury prone goalie. Like, just an unmitigated disappointment of an offseason

Sorry didn’t mean to quote you twice

Although I have gone on record as someone who was a fan of this offseason, I agree with everything you outlined. With his job on the line, you would think there would've been a bigger sense of urgency to get this team over the edge. At the end of the day, it's that faith that Dubas has that makes me faithful in this Roster. Dubas is a very smart guy, so him putting a giant vote of confidence out like that gives me a lot of hope. I think this team will turn it around and be better, it's just that central idea of identity that needs to be ironed out.

Also, as important defense is, we cannot sacrifice offense for it. ZAR, Kampf, and NAK / Simmonds all on a line kills our offense

Absolutely, very smart guy but his loyalty and love of certain players MIGHT cost him his job.

It really sucks when you get the whole ACGM “what would this team look like if Kyle did nothing” and it looks really freaking good lol



This pretty much sums up how I feel. We are an off-season away from this all being over.

When Jarnkrok was with Nashville he did very well on the LW with Bonino and Smith to make this super line. No joke that line was insane

I would try Jarnkrok with Matthews and Nylander

With Sharks open for business I wonder about them as we got 5.25mill in LTIR with Muzzin so Labanc, Meier, Couture could happen

Or

Do you call Columbus about Gavrikov and Nyqvist.

There are teams who desperately want Bedard and while prices wont be cheap time to open the wallet and spend

Not gonna lie if u play your cards right

Go get Gavrikov from CBJ then with the remainder of 5.25 make a huge trade for Meier

Whe. Looking at the cap leafs can spend 5.25 mill rn even if Murray comes back

So to me why not divide it up as such

Go to CBJ send a 2024 2nd + Voit for Gavrikov

Then go to SJS and send 2 1sts + whatever for Meier 50% ret

Against philly


Meier-Matthews-Nylander
Robertson-Tavares-Marner
Engvall-Kampf-Jarnkrok
Bunting-Kerfoot-Simmonds

Rielly-Liligren
Gavrikov-Brodie
Giordano-Sandin

Nah, the Murray trade sucked right from the start because he’s too injury prone in addition to sucking.

How do you lose to the literal worst team in the league?!?!

no kidding, they almost need a player like hyman to get into the dirty areas

Having 1 injury really doesnt mean much for us in the grand scheme. Murray could come back and be healthy for the remainder of the year like what happened with Freddie a few years back and rarely have an injury.

Heck we have dealt with this before if Murray can come play about 30 games for us and put up good numbers were good for now as it will give the real starter a rest.

Easily my least favourite part about the Leafs having a bad stretch is logging onto ACGM and seeing the plethora of flat out awful Marner trades

They have their 3rd string goalie Kallgren in net, who has not won a game, yes 1 injury means a ton. It was a terrible decision to trade for Murray

Our team is consistently a mocking joke.

Any goalie playing with that performance in front is not winning

Put Vasi, Shesterkin, Saros etc the other team will still win as this team when they not in the mood leaves them to dry

That’s a bad take

It really isnt

We have seen these goalies get hung out to dry before

Vasi in the CBJ series was a prime example

Shesterkin almost lost to Arizona yesterday and through times last year big yikes

Saros got hung so many times his body gave out for the playoffs resulting in Ingram season

Hellybuyck gets hung out almost yearly by the Jets yet somehow stays alive long enough to at least give them a point

Any goalie who is in net with a team in front who aint trying will get railed

The funny thing about this year

Were 1 point away from 2nd in the Atlantic

Of all 32 teams only 2 are doing good with regression being seen with everyone else but the lottery/bedard hopefuls