Round 1 - Boston Bruins (A2) vs Toronto Maple Leafs (A3)

[Coconuts]

1 minute ago, I.Am.Ironman said:

 

Precisely my point. Manny and Burr have how many cups and olympic golds?

 

 

Foote's experience, and more importantly success, as a player trumps whatever difference there is between being a defensive coach for 6 years vs assitant coach for 7. IMO anyway, this is all subjective. I guess I'd put it this way, all of Manny, Burr, Gonchar and Foote had great careers, but who would carry more of an aura? The 2 that have won cups and olympic golds, or the two who haven't? And I loved both Burr and Manny as Canucks.

 

Championships are team accomplishments, which isn't to take away from Foote's having been an excellent player. 

 

Gonchar? No argument, he's held a coaching role since 2015 and his coaching resume includes cup wins with the Penguins. Foote? As a coach he's done less than Malhotra. 

[Hairy Kneel]

48 minutes ago, Jaimito said:

 

 

 

 

 

Cookie knows Lol

[Miss Korea]

9 minutes ago, Coconuts said:

 

Championships are team accomplishments, which isn't to take away from Foote's having been an excellent player. 

 

Gonchar? No argument, he's held a coaching role since 2015 and his coaching resume includes cup wins with the Penguins. Foote? As a coach he's done less than Malhotra. 

 

When you ask any coach if they rely on their past playing achievements, they typically say no.  Patrick Roy the coach has completely different aura than Roy the goalie.  Gretzky the coach?  Face turned into a tomato.  Tocchet/Foote have different auras than when they played.

 

Auras.  hehehe

[Rip The Mesh]

 

[Jaimito]

Is anyone here surprised at the situation?

 

Their deficiencies were evident all year.  High end talents but not playoff competitive. 

[Coconuts]

3 minutes ago, Rip The Mesh said:

 

 

 

 

[Coconuts]

3 minutes ago, Jaimito said:

Is anyone here surprised at the situation?

 

Their deficiencies were evident all year.  High end talents but not playoff competitive. 

 

Not at all 

 

This is what happens when you match Toronto up against Boston

 

[SuchaNuxtalgia]

The Shanascam = spam in the can

If EVER a roster needed an IED detonation..this is it! Yet there they are, perched atop the capfriendly team list, 14 mill into the LTIR sinkhole.

 

Would imagine JTpajamas finally will agree to exit stage left. Bet they'll 50% retained, trade his contract west for the ol' proverbial bagga' pucks.

How does Hogtown like the WillyNilly deal now?! What a mess!

[I.Am.Ironman]

42 minutes ago, Coconuts said:

 

Championships are team accomplishments, which isn't to take away from Foote's having been an excellent player. 

 

Gonchar? No argument, he's held a coaching role since 2015 and his coaching resume includes cup wins with the Penguins. Foote? As a coach he's done less than Malhotra. 

 

I guess my point is that I value a combination of playing and coaching career. It's inexact. Yes Manny has put in more time but the teams he has coached have also done F all. I think that argument would hold more weight if he had mad a few runs during his 7 years as an assistant, but he hasn't. It's not enough to put him above Foote imo.

[Ghostsof1915]

7 minutes ago, SuchaNuxtalgia said:

The Shanascam = spam in the can

If EVER a roster needed an IED detonation..this is it! Yet there they are, perched atop the capfriendly team list, 14 mill into the LTIR sinkhole.

 

Would imagine JTpajamas finally will agree to exit stage left. Bet they'll 50% retained, trade his contract west for the ol' proverbial bagga' pucks.

How does Hogtown like the WillyNilly deal now?! What a mess!

Tavares is only one problem.

They have to deal Marner as well. You going to retain 50% of that too?

That's $11 million in salary for an extra two seasons gone.

They sadly are better off asking Marner and Tavares to waive their NMC and move them at the deadline.

That's almost $22 million off the books in 2025-26.

Toronto better look for a gamebreaker with their first rounder this year.

[The Arrogant Worms]

I am in a happy place reading Laffs fans comments 

[The Arrogant Worms]

Marner has taken the lead in the whiner in the playoffs 

[KesLord]

Matthews
 

Edited April 28 by KesLord

[Rip The Mesh]

[Miss Korea]

2 hours ago, Jaimito said:

Is anyone here surprised at the situation?

 

Their deficiencies were evident all year.  High end talents but not playoff competitive. 

 

2 hours ago, Coconuts said:

 

Not at all 

 

This is what happens when you match Toronto up against Boston

 

I don't even think it's about them being playoff chokers.  This is the first time in a long while that Toronto is just objectively the inferior team.  Even on paper, even in a regular season setting, they are worse than Boston in every way.  Inferior forward depth.  Vastly Inferior defensive depth.  ASTRONOMICALLY Inferior goaltending depth.  This is year is different from previous ones because for the first time in a while... Toronto was not a great regular season team.  Leafs fans were far less optimistic this year, and that's because they showed no promise throughout.  This inevitable defeat is far less cathartic.

[Coconuts]

13 minutes ago, Miss Korea said:

 

 

I don't even think it's about them being playoff chokers.  This is the first time in a long while that Toronto is just objectively the inferior team.  Even on paper, even in a regular season setting, they are worse than Boston in every way.  Inferior forward depth.  Vastly Inferior defensive depth.  ASTRONOMICALLY Inferior goaltending depth.  This is year is different from previous ones because for the first time in a while... Toronto was not a great regular season team.  Leafs fans were far less optimistic this year, and that's because they showed no promise throughout.  This inevitable defeat is far less cathartic.

 

But still so satisfying 

[PistolPete13]

3 hours ago, Curmudgeon said:

 

I think you've hit the nail on the head. If the Leafs can't get past Boston, I think it might spell the end of Shanahan. Ten seasons, six and soon to be seven first round defeats, two seasons missing the playoffs, and one defeat in the second round. So, one playoff round won out of eight playoff seasons.  

 

That’s Benning level performance.

It’s amazing that he kept his job so long. That team was built for the regular season.

 

[Curmudgeon]

47 minutes ago, PistolPete13 said:

That’s Benning level performance.

It’s amazing that he kept his job so long. That team was built for the regular season.

 

Funny to me that you say that. In my original post I had added a sentence at the end that said "Very Benning-like" but I deleted it. 

 

And I slightly disagree that the team was built for the regular season. I think the team was built to feed the egos of Matthews, Marner, Tavares, Nylander and Rielly. Next year they will use up $54,153,000 of Toronto's cap. This seems unsustainable to me.

[iinatcc]

25 minutes ago, Curmudgeon said:

 

Funny to me that you say that. In my original post I had added a sentence at the end that said "Very Benning-like" but I deleted it. 

 

And I slightly disagree that the team was built for the regular season. I think the team was built to feed the egos of Matthews, Marner, Tavares, Nylander and Rielly. Next year they will use up $54,153,000 of Toronto's cap. This seems unsustainable to me.

 

The benefit of the doubt I give on the salary structure is that there was an expectation that the cap was going to go up but Covid happened and kind of derailed that. The Cap would probably have been 100 Million by now more than enough to fill supporting players around their star players and their salary. 

 

[Iron Fist]

10 minutes ago, iinatcc said:

 

The benefit of the doubt I give on the salary structure is that there was an expectation that the cap was going to go up but Covid happened and kind of derailed that. The Cap would probably have been 100 Million by now more than enough to fill supporting players around their star players and their salary. 

 

NO Defense, No goaltending.  Laffs gotta take 1 step back and retool, much like the coilers

[Drakrami]

Dont know why people always diss Leaf's defense. Their defense actually isnt that bad. Their problem is more like when you paying 50% of your salary cap to 4 players and those 4 players don't carry you. You have 0 depth, no good role players in the 3rd/4th lines because they are all making 825K. 

[Alflives]

4 hours ago, Drakrami said:

Dont know why people always diss Leaf's defense. Their defense actually isnt that bad. Their problem is more like when you paying 50% of your salary cap to 4 players and those 4 players don't carry you. You have 0 depth, no good role players in the 3rd/4th lines because they are all making 825K. 

The Leafs highest paid players don’t make the sacrifice needed to play defensively. They are shy players. Soft. 

[LaBamba]

4 hours ago, Drakrami said:

Dont know why people always diss Leaf's defense. Their defense actually isnt that bad. Their problem is more like when you paying 50% of your salary cap to 4 players and those 4 players don't carry you. You have 0 depth, no good role players in the 3rd/4th lines because they are all making 825K. 

I don’t know if it’s just me but I’ve always got the impression that Sheldon Keefe is a condescending, passive aggressive asshole. I feel like he sets the tone and the culture for the team. He doesn’t seem approachable. Their biggest mistake was making Dubas GM over Mark Hunter. Since then their development within the organization has stagnated. 

[Rekker]

32 minutes ago, LaBamba said:

Their biggest mistake was making Dubas GM over Mark Hunter.

Yip. This was the fork in the road that doomed Shanaplan. 

[Hogs and Podz]

Might not agree but to me Petey has some similar character traits to Mariner, Matthews, Nylander... Skill for days but not mentally tough yet. 

 

Unfortunately for T. O., they don't have any old school like, character vets on the team that play a significant role to help show these young guys how to play playoff hockey.  We do more so with character gritty guys like JT, Dakota, Myers, big Z, Lindy, Cole, Soucy, Bluger... Petey has great role models around him, Toronto does not... So as a result they aren't learning.  Whereas Petey is... Hopefully fast enough to find away to contribute in this series.