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Around the League 2019-2024 Edition

Oilers made line up changes. Dallas now has had time to adjust. Don't see how this is not a 7 game series with the last game leaving towards the Stars due to superior goaltending.
 
LeafOfFaith said:
I think the exact opposite, Dallas and NYR are much cleaner than the Florida rats.

Edmonton is fine, but it's Edmonton and we'll never hear the end of it. That can't happen until after a Leafs cup.
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That's what is hard about cheering against McDavid's team. He's been robbed off any type of international chance to score a Golden Goal of his own, has had to deal with an Oilers franchise who gives Lucic and Nurse and Campbell crazy contracts and trades away number one overall and league MVPs for peanuts. He's a good ambassador for the game and by all accounts a stand-up guy. He has performed at MVP levels throughout his career. He deserves a cup.

But alas Oilers fans would be impossible to deal with if they won.
 
They took some cap risks that the Leafs feared taking. Many criticisms, even around here, about Ekholm's contract. They said fuck that shit, who cares we'll make it work, and just brought over the best d available. Dubas was too sweet spot of shared risky by the end. Sometimes you have to go balls deep and just get the top talent.

Really it's the sweet spot of shared risk mentally that's at fault for the Leafs never winning a presidents trophy or truly being a top 2-3 team in the NHL. The priority was never to get better, only to maintain what they have and keep a clean balance sheet
 
leafman101 said:
Like fuck, 3 years ago in the Canadian division we were so much better than them. Then we gave them Hyman, and they added Bouchard, Kane and Ekholm, and we've been chasing "playoff" players like Bert, Domi, Boosh and Edmundson.
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It's your fucking goaltending. It's always been your goaltending in the playoffs. I've been saying it for years. Get a damn real nerves of steel goalie.

Can't always have the second best guy in the crease.
 
Preston said:
They took some cap risks that the Leafs feared taking. Many criticisms, even around here, about Ekholm's contract. They said fuck that shit, who cares we'll make it work, and just brought over the best d available. Dubas was too sweet spot of shared risky by the end. Sometimes you have to go balls deep and just get the top talent.

Really it's the sweet spot of shared risk mentally that's at fault for the Leafs never winning a presidents trophy or truly being a top 2-3 team in the NHL. The priority was never to get better, only to maintain what they have and keep a clean balance sheet
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The risk with ekholm wasn't just the contract. Its that he was in the middle of a year that looked a lot like old man decline was setting in and if you were wrong about him bouncing back he wrecked your cap structure.
 
MindzEye said:
The risk with ekholm wasn't just the contract. Its that he was in the middle of a year that looked a lot like old man decline was setting in and if you were wrong about him bouncing back he wrecked your cap structure.
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Yes I agree. The Leafs were afraid to be wrong so they didn't really take any cap risks. As a result their upside has been limited.
 
there's no real sense in nitpicking every move or missed move.

Dubas pretty much matched bad moves with good moves. Pretty even steven. Kept the team good but never really improved it. And yeah a lot of that was risk-aversion because one good thing is he kept us out of any serious cap trouble, but maybe some cap trouble would have been worth the risk.
 
The one quote I'll never forget from Dubas is when he described the importance of luck in the playoffs. And as a result the importance of not necessarily improving, but extending the window as long as possible. Because the more kicks at the can you have as a top 5-7 team, the more likely you are to break through one year. He certainly GMed like this was his mantra.

I didn't necessarily disagree with that at the time. Perfectly fine mentality. But at a certain point it was probably time to take a risk or two to get them to that next level. Because being really good as opposed to a top contender clearly wasn't working out, especially playing in this division.
 
I mean it;'s kinda true, but at the same time it's not like he stood pat. He was trying to improve the team and was always making moves. It's just that for every good move there was a bad one.
 
Things never really got uncomfortable cap -wise for them though. It was always smooth sailing and they rarely pushed things like Tampa or Vegas or most teams that break through. Obviously you don't want to push it but there's value to maximizing your talent level. He did a lot of good things though, I agree. The McCabe trade was a perfect example of brilliant sweet spot of shared risking.
 
yeah but really capwise he was pretty genius - the leafs got absolutely screwed by covid but still never got themselves into any serious cap trouble. things could have been much worse.

it's the flat out hockey moves that just weren't good enough.

And really it's probably the one series of moves that resulted in choosing Tavares and Kerf over Kadri and Hyman and capspace that really clamped down on the ceiling of the team.
 
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