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The Fantastically Beautiful Joyously Superfun 22-23 Season Celebration Thread

If ever there was an "all-in" season, this should have been it for Dubas. No contract - show me season.

Fuck toughness, those guys are a dime/dozen in the offseason - why pay draft assets for them at the deadline?

We needed to put together a top 9 that other teams couldn't match-up against, but instead we've got extra d-men and two lines of penalty killers.

As for the dreams of Knies making a difference right away - what makes anyone think that Keefe is going to give any rope to an NHL rookie - especially in the playoffs?
 
I get the criticism around Lafferty/Engvall/Schenn but quite frankly, I think he was almost there.

If the adds were McCabe, ROR, Acciari and he just picked up one more decent forward after that I think the vibes around here would be different. People are allowed to be upset about that obviously but everything up to that three trade day was fine, IMO.
 
Why are simmonds and Z-Horny dressed for a game if they don't do something to spark the team? Our 5'9 1st line winger is the oneixing it up instead of our 4th line toughness.
 
If the replacement spends their Kerfoot, Jarnkrok, Engvall, Holl, Murray money on effective toughness, I have no qualms with that.

It's the 1st rounders on busted down reputation players, the deep need to replace high talent young defenders with Bogosians, Lyubushkin's, and Schenn's every fucking year.

Put value on in prime Jake McCabe's, or the forward versions of him. You can absolutely build a team identity in surrounding Auston-Mitch-Willy with guys like that. But stop tying one hand behind your fucking back with the ZARs/Simmonds/Lafferty/etc, & veteran plug defenders.

Invest money in effective toughness, and play the fast hungry kids at the bottom of your lineup. Don't invest in soft perimeter players and put slow pluggy veterans at the bottom of your lineup.
 
I get the criticism around Lafferty/Engvall/Schenn but quite frankly, I think he was almost there.

If the adds were McCabe, ROR, Acciari and he just picked up one more decent forward after that I think the vibes around here would be different. People are allowed to be upset about that obviously but everything up to that three trade day was fine, IMO.
This is where the frustration lies with me. I didn't know much about McCabe but I loved the idea of the trade if they got the evaluation of the player right it was a no brainer. ROR.. We'll see how that goes but I'm obviously good with that trade too. He was very close but he appeared to botch it at the 1 yard line. He had an opportunity to shore up the depth on deadline day and instead traded away a good forward, a good young d and in turn acquired 2 more shit D to add to an already bloated d corps. It was messy. Not to mention one of those shit d will be replacing their young stud in the lineup. That's a SIGNIFICANT downgrade.

It couldn't have been the plan to have Lafferty, ZAR and Kampf has 3 of their 12 forwards while they run 9 active d, could it? It just seems like they had a plan and it was botched.. But based on Kyle's comments it seems he was content after his final trade and things were quiet on his front after that. So I don't know what to even think other than to say it was a bit sloppy by Kyle.
 
Agreed the only excuse would be they're not trying. Hopefully thats true and hopefully they can flip the switch later.

But 14th best win/loss record since the deadline and TB now within striking distance for home ice.
Here is a stat request for you to check out.

All things considered, is it better for the Leaf to have or not have home ice advantage for the Tampa series?
Factoring in, our goalies road records, and how good a team we are on the road vs home.
 
It goes back longer than that.

10th in point % since January 1st. That's just not championship calibre. They were 11th in point % between Jan 1 and the ROR trade. The deadline was an opportunity to counteract a trend that had a decent (and growing) sample behind it. At least the nerdies were solid Jan 1-mid Feb so there were signs that the team was better than it's point %.

Glasses keeps making the same mistake, and Keefe keeps making the same mistake. I'm not against adding leadership, pugnacity, truckurage or whatever the fuck. But I am against overpaying for it, and playing it ahead of much, much better hockey players. But here we are doing it again and again and again. But it's the one massive mistake the hockey establishment will never blame you for, because it aligns with their overall narrative about what winning hockey is.


Well....between Jan.1 and Feb.17 sure they dipped down to a tie for 10th best record with a 100pt pace but they were still top 5 in the nerdies.

If we break down the season into quarter (because the trade deadline came with exactly 20gms left - let's say we go 20gms, 21gms, 21gms, 20gms - with the last 20 being in progress)....

All Situations Numbers

Q1: 20gms, 103pt pace (#9), 51.9gf% (#11), 53.1xgf% (#8)
Q2: 21gms, 125pt pace (#3), 61.3gf% (#3), 57.3xgf% (#2)
Q3: 21gms, 106pt pace (#9), 54.9gf% (#6), 54.7xgf% (#5)
Q4: 14gms, 94pt pace (#14), 50.7gf% (#14), 51.0xgf% (#17)

Q1 was a bit off but that was a terrible start in october that they had a nice recovery from.

we haven't seen thoroughly mediocre play like this over an extended stretch for a long while I don't think.
 
And it isn't completely crazy or surprising. When was the last time the Leafs had 4 players this bad in the every day lineup? Lafferty, Kampf (without Engvall), ZAR, and Schenn. That's more garbage than we've seen in years. Can't blame the big boys.
 
I wasn't in the GDT last night bc I was at the game, but... I thought we looked fine last night? Were the nerdies not good?
 
That's the scariest bit imo. We've gotten peak or close Matthews back (9G 18PTS in his last 13), Marner is playing out of his mind and we're still playing like junk.

That's instructive
 
Here is a stat request for you to check out.

All things considered, is it better for the Leaf to have or not have home ice advantage for the Tampa series?
Factoring in, our goalies road records, and how good a team we are on the road vs home.


Leafs at Home: 118pt pace, 56.2xgf%, .907sv%
Leafs on Road: 98pt pace, 51.6xgf%, .905sv%
 
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