The Mother-fucking goddamn Off-season Thread

[leafman101]

not those of us that believe in process over small sample playoff results.


I’ll be over the moon if he can even keep par with Dubas.

the process was flawed.

the only way to explain that away is to pretend like they are the unluckiest group of people ever. lWhich is rich coming from the guy keeping a list of explaining things away. you are the same as everyone you are arguing with, just with your own bias.

 

[leafman101]

Btw there is a totally untapped market for Gm stats.

What are Dubas and Trelivings goals above expected twitter nerds?

 

[Montana]

the process was flawed.

your opinion. I disagree.


#5, #2, #3, #5 in xGF% ~4 straight seasons, and a league leading 7 straight playoff appearances without any signs of it stopping soon….is the exact kind of process I believe in.


(and just to be clear, I’m not saying anyone else needs to accept that….that’s just the kind of thing I’d prioritize over purely playoff outcomes, which as we know I dont value as highly as everyone else in the first place.)

the only way to explain that away is to pretend like they are the unluckiest group of people ever.

nah, just recognize the actual poor luck they’d had.


(they lost some series on their own…and lost a number of coin flip series against elite teams [bad luck to be in our division]…and handful of times. Tavares game 1 injury… Got goalied by Florida…despite playing good enough to be up 3-1….shit happens.)

a coin flip is 50/50 probability…..having a handful go the same way back to back to back is gonna happen. (especially if it’s weighted, thanks to division/playoff format)

Which is rich coming from the guy keeping a list of explaining things away

#whoooosh

 

[leafman101]

If we are being honest are we really attributing the Leafs success over the last 7 years to Dubas/Lou and not Mathew’s/Marner/Willy? They became a 100 point top 10 team the second those guys entered the NHL.

I don’t agree with Dubas roster construction around them though. I don’t think surrounding them with low event players will ever lead us to the promise land. There is a reason why we lose tight one goal games every year, and can’t win if those 4 aren’t scoring. Dubas philosophy didn’t get the most out of the big 4 and he had his chance to prove me wrong.

I want the Leafs to be a team that is deep in speed and skill. I think that’s how they get over th hump. What Dubas was building just cancelled out the advantage we have with the big 4. Every year it’s guys like Paul and Cousins that burry us and we blame Auston and Mitch for not out scoring 12 guys on their own,

it will be interesting to see Trelivings philosophy to build out the roster.

 

[leafman101]

a coin flip is 50/50 probability…..having a handful go the same way back to back to back is gonna happen. (especially if it’s weighted, thanks to division/playoff format)

the odds of the Leafs playoff success over the last 7 years is like less than 1%. The nerds did the math. It’s extreme bad luck.

 

[Volcanologist]

what depth are you getting that's going to compensate for Matthews and Tavares scoring ZERO goals in a playoff series?

 

[Montana]

If we are being honest are we really attributing the Leafs success over the last 7 years to Dubas/Lou and not Mathew’s/Marner/Willy? They became a 100 point top 10 team the second those guys entered the NHL.

I’d say Dubas/Keefe teams are better than Lou/Babs teams, yes.

I don’t agree with Dubas roster construction around them though. I don’t think surrounding them with low event players will ever lead us to the promise land. There is a reason why we lose tight one goal games every year, and can’t win if those 4 aren’t scoring. Dubas philosophy didn’t get the most out of the big 4 and he had his chance to prove me wrong.

this idea he surrounded them with only low event scrubs is silly….he surrounded them with Tavares, Hyman, Bunting, RoR, Kapanen, AJ, Mikheyev, now Knies….and yes, because of keeping the core three, and adding Tavares to that, he had to go cheaper on bottom six forwards, and at times those gambles absolutely sucked. That’s what happens with gambles & not having the benefit of hindsight in the moment.

I want the Leafs to be a team that is deep in speed and skill. I think that’s how they get over th hump. What Dubas was building just cancelled out the advantage we have with the big 4. Every year it’s guys like Paul and Cousins that burry us and we blame Auston and Mitch for not out scoring 12 guys on their own,

it will be interesting to see Trelivings philosophy to build out the roster.

I hope you get what you want.

 

[Montana]

the odds of the Leafs playoff success over the last 7 years is like less than 1%. The nerds did the math. It’s extreme bad luck.

…..

the only way to explain that away is to pretend like they are the unluckiest group of people ever.

…..

 

[LeafGm]

Treliving has done a lot of dumb shit. I wouldn't necessarily put the Coleman move in the same bucket as a lot of the others tho. He's really good. I think you're heavily underrating the player here.

If you want to argue the Coleman deal isn’t as bad as, say, the James Neal deal, obviously I won’t disagree with you.

I still think Coleman’s deal is horrific though, even if it’s not on the same level as Treliving’s worst.

As for whether I’m underrating the player, I don’t care how good your “nerdies” are if you’re a forward incapable of cracking the 40-point mark and you’ve been handed a six year contract at roughly $5M per year AND you’re on the wrong side of 30 in year #1 of the deal.

It’s a brutal contract reminiscent of Nonis, Burke & JFJ.

 

[leafman101]

this idea he surrounded them with only low event scrubs is silly….he surrounded them with Tavares, Hyman, Bunting, RoR, Kapanen, AJ, Mikheyev, now Knies….and yes, because of keeping the core three, and adding Tavares to that, he had to go cheaper on bottom six forwards, and at times those gambles absolutely sucked. That’s what happens with gambles & not having the benefit of hindsight in the moment.

not all at once. This year half the roster was intentionally low event players. Kerf, Jarnkrok, Kampf, Acciari, lafferty, ZAR. That was Dubas design.

I’m not a fan and wouldn’t bet on it suddenly working.

 

[hockeylover]

I kinda feel like the process was pretty good initially and Dubas leaned further away from it in direct response to more losing in the playoffs.

 

[Montana]

…something else I’d add to our bad luck column. We’re the first franchise that basically got zero RFA value out of our draft picks. (except for Willy)……no hometown discounts like Boston and Tampa get time and time again..,.

…and we also don’t have Florida or Tampa’s tax situation that encourages other mid tier players to be more than happy extending there for prices they wouldnt sign with us for.

…and then apparently there’s the Canada/US thing where some guys don’t want to be in Canada, post pandemic.

none of them in isolation tilts things….but there’s just a fair amount of things, any Toronto GM has to overcome, that some others don‘t.

 

[Montana]

…something else I’d add to our bad luck column. We’re the first franchise that basically got zero RFA value out of our draft picks. (except for Willy)……no hometown discounts like Boston and Tampa get time and time again..,.

…and we also don’t have Florida or Tampa’s tax situation that encourages other mid tier players to be more than happy extending there for prices they wouldnt sign with us for.

…and then apparently there’s the Canada/US thing where some guys don’t want to be in Canada, post pandemic.

none of them in isolation tilts things….but there’s just a fair amount of things, any Toronto GM has to overcome, that some others don‘t.

on the flip side, we do get some Toronto boys coming back here….so Tavares, Gio, Spezza, maybe RoR….we have a bit of an advantage there.

 

[Preston]

If you want to argue the Coleman deal isn’t as bad as, say, the James Neal deal, obviously I won’t disagree with you.

I still think Coleman’s deal is horrific though, even if it’s not on the same level as Treliving’s worst.

As for whether I’m underrating the player, I don’t care how good your “nerdies” are if you’re a forward incapable of cracking the 40-point mark and you’ve been handed a six year contract at roughly $5M per year AND you’re on the wrong side of 30 in year #1 of the deal.

It’s a brutal contract reminiscent of Nonis, Burke & JFJ.

Fair, and I know you're consistent with this and won't drift away from this take because you hate the player I'm about to mention.. But 5 on 5, he scores at a rate nearly as high as John Tavares. I personally wouldn't consider 5 on 5 P/60 a nerdie.

 

[leafman101]

I kinda feel like the process was pretty good initially and Dubas leaned further away from it in direct response to more losing in the playoffs.

possibly. But Zeke posted his yearly moves yesterday and the Simmons’s, Clifford, Folignos etc started pretty early. I think year 2. Maybe it got more extreme as the losses piled up, but was never absent.

 

[Preston]

I think his low event fixation came later on. But he did make a lot of gudpro, data ignoring moves pretty early, yeah

 

[Montana]

I kinda feel like the process was pretty good initially and Dubas leaned further away from it in direct response to more losing in the playoffs.

I think there’s some truth to this…I also think it’s blown out of proportion as the reason we lost to Florida, say. (or worthy of axing him over.)

Like, we did beat Tampa.…and Bob is on the kind of heater that can just beat anyone.

 

[Montana]

I think his low event fixation came later on. But he did make a lot of gudpro, data ignoring moves pretty early, yeah

ignored based on public data…..we can’t praise Treliving for talking about data that blows the public stuff away, and then also complain about Dubas choices using only public data imo.

Or at least, I think it’s noteworthy that we think we know more about these various players than we probably do, based on public stuff.

…and I’m not saying they were the right moves. Just that we have incomplete pictures of why decisions are made. Like everyone hated getting Schenn and dunked on it….but Tampa saw value in him (and Bogosian) and I thought Schenn had a great playoffs for us.

They could also have far superior data that leads to trades that makes piles of sense on paper, that then flunk out…and because the public data also aligned, we assume they’re morons.

 

[leafman101]

Public data is definitely limited, and I agree with the premise, but I wouldn’t bet on private data existing that says the bottom core 6 (TM) can produce offense.

 

[Preston]

There's enough smoke out there to confidently say that the nerds were being at least slightly muzzled near the end compared to when Dubas was initially hired. You can tell even by the way they played on the ice, not just the personnel decisions. It was everything that the nerds believed was the wrong way to play hockey.

But to Tana's point, maybe they got new nerds that believed in a completely different approach to playing hockey. We are all speculating here, which is what this forum is all about!