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Leaf Rumours

even if it was two tenth overall picks it would have been a good trade.

burke hasn't surrounded him with talent to compete, though.

burke committed to a rebuild-while-you-contend. but he just hasn't put the pieces in place to do that. i mean, could you imagine if prior to the 1998-99 season the leafs had used their 1999 and 2000 firsts to acquire palffy, kovalev or allison (youngish guys who had breakout years of sorts in 97-98)?? the leafs were coming off of two awful years that netted 4th and 10th overall picks... there would have been equal heat on dryden et al for pulling the trigger on such a deal. but damn, what a steal it would have been.

the point is that those trades can be good trades. the kessel move will ultimately be defined in a short sighted way -- how kessel vs. seguin does -- but, really, the trade should be viewed at from the perspective of where else burke went wrong.
 
I stick by my original opinion. It was a trade for two 1sts and a 2nd... as far as the Leafs are concerned it doesn't really matter where those picks end up being. They still don't have those picks. The deal hasn't changed for the Leafs since the day it happened. The positions of the picks only matters to how the Bruins made out in the trade.
 
Listening to the radio yesterday and there are people saying "be patient, Burke is building a winner" - I call total BS on that.

The whole point of the kessel trade was not "to wait". He pretty much said he wants to win now and doesnt have a long term draft by draft building type philosophy.

And what we're seeing here is his whole way of thinking unraveling before our very eyes.
 
The amazing thing for Chiarelli is that he was supposedly in a tough position,wanting to keep his numbers down and not really wanting to buckle and pay Kessel anything more than X. And in waddles a guy who played one game of AHL hockey who apparently has based his top six,bottom six theory on a career that is entirley in his own mind.

And the guy, feeling sorry for Chiarelli, overpays him by a first rounder instead of a second rounder.

And look at Chiarelli's team now. Its rock solid, and about to become a LOT more solid. Man, did lady luck ever shine on this guy. He has a contract for at least the next three to four years thanks to Burke.
 
And look at Chiarelli's team now. Its rock solid, and about to become a LOT more solid.
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I keep hearing this, and I still don't buy it.

It's a mediocre offensive club with a lot of money tied up in guys with significant injury histories, and general mediocrity. The blueline is uninspiring to say the least beyond Chara, and now they've got big money tied into him until he's 41. The goaltending is incredible right now though, and covers up a lot of faults in the club...but it gets really expensive after next year when Rask becomes an RFA, with a 5 million dollar season remaining on what will be a 38 yr old Tim Thomas if they don't move him before that comes about (and weaken their goaltending significantly)

They're 8th in the east right now, and were a 6th place, 91 pt bubble team last year. Seguin may very well turn into the guy who leads them to glory, and yeah...he and Rask are sure a nice Blue & White gift to the city of Boston, but I don't see this fantastic situation in Boston that I keep hearing about. Seidenberg, Boychuk, Ference isn't a 2-3-4 on a "rock solid" team imo.
 
Giguere: $6.0
Komisarek: $4.5
Lebda: $1.5
Capspace: $3.0

Total: $15.0m


$15m of completely wasted/unused capsapce, that should be paying 2-3 top-end forwards to score many goals for us right now.

That's what's wrong with the team.

Boston will still have to be fortunate to win the Kessel trade.
 
zeke said:
Giguere: $6.0
Komisarek: $4.5
Lebda: $1.5
Capspace: $3.0

Total: $15.0m


$15m of completely wasted/unused capsapce, that should be paying 2-3 top-end forwards to score many goals for us right now.

That's what's wrong with the team.

Boston will still have to be fortunate to win the Kessel trade.
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meh.. i know you have faith in rynnas, scrivens and reimer -- and in the long run i do too -- but that $15mn wouldn't matter if gustavsson was the starter.
 
Don't we have $5M in capspace that he's sitting on?

And re Boston, we can debate till we're blue in the face about the trade and the picks, but regardless of where Boston ended up picking, Burke blew it on the trade. He had Chiarelli by the balls without anywhere to send Kessel to (who only supposedly wanted to sign with us), he had a team that had lost a few more vets at the deadline and in the offseason and it was reasonable to foresee us being worse than the year prior (when we picked 7th overall), he could've signed Kessel to the offer sheet and saved a 1st (but he doesn't believe in offer sheets, of course), and in overpaying with an extra 1st he didn't bother to lottery protect the first one (he didn't even TRY!) because of course we were going to win our division last year.

And so it goes, we lose out on Hall just to have one extra year of Kessel last year, we lose our 2nd (and when you get Ross and McKegg outside the first round, let's not hear that 2nds are worthless again, ok?), and we are in the process of giftwrapping a top 5 pick for Chia again in 2011.
 
Boston ain't that great. They're all goaltending and chara.

Not even a decent rumor to be had. I think Burke is simply screwed at this point.

Not sure what he can really do this offseason either. There isn't a lot available. On the bright side, we have our pick in 2012...right now it's looking to be a good one again.
 
Leafs will improve next season just in time for the team to **** up their own first rounder. That's the way it goes with this organization.
 
Not sure what he can really do this offseason either. There isn't a lot available. On the bright side, we have our pick in 2012...right now it's looking to be a good one again.
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Dont worry, we will end up finishing 9th or 10th in the conference next season just to screw up that first rounder.
 
zeke said:
our goaltending would be no worse if Jiggy wasn't here.
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yeah, that's my point. the goaltending might not be any worse.. but unless one of the marlies guys is ready to start... it isn't any better.

though i do think that giggy is still a better goaltender than gustavsson.
 
msun30 said:
yeah, that's my point. the goaltending might not be any worse.. but unless one of the marlies guys is ready to start... it isn't any better.

though i do think that giggy is still a better goaltender than gustavsson.
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I don't know about that.

Giguere can be good for moderately sized spurts - but can't seem to hold it together for a full 60 minutes usually. There's always some sort of breakdown where he lets in backbreakers.

Gus seems to be the exact opposite. Either totally on for 60 minutes or totally off. Very hit or miss, but I can forgive inconsistency from someone who is still pretty green. Sticking with him - and his never say die attitude, which I love - will pay off ultimately, I think.

But the gig should be up for Gig after his contract expires at the end of the season.
 
msun30 said:
yeah, that's my point. the goaltending might not be any worse.. but unless one of the marlies guys is ready to start... it isn't any better.

though i do think that giggy is still a better goaltender than gustavsson.
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that's fine. I wouldn't have much problem with getting below-average goaltending if we weren't paying $7.5m for it, and were using that money to give ourselves a front-end offensive team.

Especially when we'd have 4 young talented options to fight for the goalie spot, so we weren't relying on just one or two guys having to step up.
 
They have to take a look at the kids this year and see if any of them have what it takes. Because they just can't go into next season wit Gus and 3 unknowns. They absolutely need to find quality NHL goaltending as soon as possible.
 
leafman101 said:
They have to take a look at the kids this year and see if any of them have what it takes. Because they just can't go into next season wit Gus and 3 unknowns. They absolutely need to find quality NHL goaltending as soon as possible.
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This is so important on a young team that makes frequent mistakes. We need a solid goalie who can still keep us in games.

Giguere might be a veteran, but he no longer has the ability to keep us in a hockey game for the full 60 mins.
 
On that same note its okay to go with a bunch of young goalies if you truly believe atleast one of them has what it takes.

But thats only if you have your own first rounder and can benefit (if thats the right word to use) from the entire team being young and making mistakes.

Pittsburgh did it with Fleury. He was god awful in his first two seasons, and only mediocre in his third season.
 
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