2020-21 State Of The Habs

[electron58]

57 minutes ago, caperns61 said:

I would actually say that would be a bad evaluation of Mete. He is a really good skater and acutally not as bad a defender as people think. When he does get beat  usually because of his size - I agree. However the things he does do well help him more then others in the defensive zone. He gets to the puck quicker then any defender on our team. He has a good  outlet pass and see the ice actually quite well.  He was never given an oppurtunity on the PP even though we have struggled for ever.

And just to put things into perspective. 

Since 2017. He has the best plus minus of any habs defensemen. +30. Not bad for someone they consider weak defensively and only 22 years old 

Player	GP	P	+/-
Victor Mete	185	34	30
Joel Edmundson	38	11	28
Shea Weber	187	102	19
Brett Kulak	147	28	15
Jordie Benn	158	37	13
Alexander Romanov	37	5	6
Noah Juulsen	44	8	6
Mike Reilly	90	23	3
Ben Chiarot	94	26	3
David Schlemko	55	7	2
Marco Scandella	20	3	1

 

Interesting stat for Mete. Maybe he will get even better with Ottawa,  as Mike Reilly did.

[HabsAlways]

16 hours ago, caperns61 said:

. 

Since 2017. He has the best plus minus of any habs defensemen. +30. Not bad for someone they consider weak defensively and only 22 years old 

 

 

Plus/Minus is a fairly misleading stat ... his +30 is a direct result of him being sheltered from tougher opponents since he is so easily beaten.   The eye test alone tells you he struggles to get the puck out of his zone and while once he does he is able to skate it with speed up the ice, it doesn't directly translate to a scoring chance.   

As to his outlet pass?  What outlet pass?   Mete does the same thing over and over ... get pinned in the corner with the puck and just shovels it along to another Hab player.  He only has a good outlet pass when not under pressure.

And lets not get started on just how ineffective he is clearing the front of the net when faced with larger opponents with more mass and reach than him.

 

Mete is what he is .. a 5th round choice who has reached his ceiling.   Lets not pretend he was some highly touted prospect who didn't pan out (Looking at you Galchenyuk).  If you're playing him in your top 4, your depth on D sucks.

 

 

[ChiLla]

16 hours ago, caperns61 said:

I would actually say that would be a bad evaluation of Mete. He is a really good skater and acutally not as bad a defender as people think. When he does get beat  usually because of his size - I agree. However the things he does do well help him more then others in the defensive zone. He gets to the puck quicker then any defender on our team. He has a good  outlet pass and see the ice actually quite well.  He was never given an oppurtunity on the PP even though we have struggled for ever.

And just to put things into perspective. 

Since 2017. He has the best plus minus of any habs defensemen. +30. Not bad for someone they consider weak defensively and only 22 years old 

Player	GP	P	+/-
Victor Mete	185	34	30
Joel Edmundson	38	11	28
Shea Weber	187	102	19
Brett Kulak	147	28	15
Jordie Benn	158	37	13
Alexander Romanov	37	5	6
Noah Juulsen	44	8	6
Mike Reilly	90	23	3
Ben Chiarot	94	26	3
David Schlemko	55	7	2
Marco Scandella	20	3	1

 

Interesting numbers indeed, I wasn't aware at all. I definitely don't like losing him for nothing but I believe Mete's biggest flaw as a dman was his lack of scoring, usually smallish dmen make up for that disadvantage by putting up solid numbers, otherwise they're too easily replaceable. If you're outscored by Jordie Benn though, there's a bit of a problem I think. I may be wrong but off the top of my head, I can't think of any undersized NHL defender who's not scoring at a somewhat decent rate and still plays a regular shift. You're right though, Mete is still young and there's probably still room for improvement.

[maas_art]

43 minutes ago, HabsAlways said:

Plus/Minus is a fairly misleading stat ... his +30 is a direct result of him being sheltered from tougher opponents since he is so easily beaten.   The eye test alone tells you he struggles to get the puck out of his zone and while once he does he is able to skate it with speed up the ice, it doesn't directly translate to a scoring chance.   

As to his outlet pass?  What outlet pass?   Mete does the same thing over and over ... get pinned in the corner with the puck and just shovels it along to another Hab player.  He only has a good outlet pass when not under pressure.

And lets not get started on just how ineffective he is clearing the front of the net when faced with larger opponents with more mass and reach than him.

 

Mete is what he is .. a 5th round choice who has reached his ceiling.   Lets not pretend he was some highly touted prospect who didn't pan out (Looking at you Galchenyuk).  If you're playing him in your top 4, your depth on D sucks.

 

 

Agree with all of this.   He's a decent depth option but nothing to worry about losing.  Honestly both players we acquired in the last 48 hours are probably more useful to us than Mete (obviously with a loss on the age side of things).

 

33 minutes ago, ChiLla said:

Interesting numbers indeed, I wasn't aware at all. I definitely don't like losing him for nothing but I believe Mete's biggest flaw as a dman was his lack of scoring, usually smallish dmen make up for that disadvantage by putting up solid numbers, otherwise they're too easily replaceable. If you're outscored by Jordie Benn though, there's a bit of a problem I think. I may be wrong but off the top of my head, I can't think of any undersized NHL defender who's not scoring at a somewhat decent rate and still plays a regular shift. You're right though, Mete is still young and there's probably still room for improvement.

So much is situational too of course.  If you ask me who do i want next to Shea Weber: Chairot or Mete, i pick Mete because he can at least retrieve pucks but if you ask me who i want on our 3rd pairing LD, im taking Chairot over Mete for sure because he's a more well-rounded Dman.  Neither should be anywhere near the top pair though. 

[ChiLla]

53 minutes ago, maas_art said:

So much is situational too of course.  If you ask me who do i want next to Shea Weber: Chairot or Mete, i pick Mete because he can at least retrieve pucks but if you ask me who i want on our 3rd pairing LD, im taking Chairot over Mete for sure because he's a more well-rounded Dman.  Neither should be anywhere near the top pair though. 

Absolutely, in a perfect world I'd use both Chiarot and Mete as #4-6 dmen and pair them with guys that complement their skill sets well. Given our roster, we don't have that luxury though

[electron58]

The Laval Rocket play only one game between now and April 30th. Would now be a good time to bring up CC? Too soon? Not much development in 1 game over the next 15-16 days, not counting the few days already.

[BigTed3]

At this point, I don't have much stress about how the season plays out. We have a pretty decent cushion right now in terms of points/games in hand combo, so if we do manage to blow it, we probably deserve to be out of the playoffs. Worst-case scenario for us right now is to limp into the playoffs and get in because Calgary also craps the bed, then just get tossed around by the Leafs in round 1.

I still have little faith in this team to turn this season around and to win with the current corps. I look at our core group and I ask myself which players are going to get better over time, which will get worse...

- Price: likely going to get worse over time, maybe he has a few small peaks left in his career, but he won't likely get back to being a .930 save percentage goalie who steals games regularly

- Weber: worse. he's been in a free fall decline over the past year and he seems to need two weeks off to be able to put together two strong games in a row.

- Petry: worse in that I doubt he can do better going forward than he's done this year. He was in the Norris discussion for most of the year until lately. Chances he's that good for the next 2-3 years? Unlikely.

- Chiarot, Edmundson, and Kulak all likely to be about the same for the next couple of years.

- Drouin: up and down but not consistent enough to provide much more than he is now. So probably what we see is what we're getting going forward.

- Danault: maybe a bit better than how he started the year, but around the same as what he's giving us now.

- Tatar: age says he's likely going to decline soon

- Gallagher: injuries are probably going to catch up to him at some point.

- Armia: doubt he's even here next year.

- Lehkonen: I think he might need a fresh start to see improvement somewhere else

- Toffoli: I doubt he gives us more than he did this year.

- Perry is in the twilight of his career.

- Staal's career already looks over.

 

So who's likely to give us more? Kotkaniemi and Suzuki are likely to both build on what they've done so far. Romanov should get better with experience. Evans maybe has a bit more to give but likely is not going to be ever be a top 6 player. Anderson I think can still give more. But by and large, we have more guys who are likely to be the same or worse next year and the year after that, and just a handful of current players who are going to get better. So most of the improvement in our club is going to come from guys who aren't yet here. Caufield. Poehling. Ylonen. Norlinder. Harris. Guhle. Struble. Primeau. We have some nice pieces to add to our roster. But now ask yourself when those players will be impact players. I asked this same question maybe 2 years ago, and I talked about how Suzuki and Kotkaniemi and Romanov would add something but how they would need time to integrate and develop. The same can be said about the other guys in our organization outside the NHL, and we all know top-tier D men can take a few years.

My point is that we're not a contender now and we don't really have our ducks lined up to suddenly become a contender next year. Any real chance at contending is going to require Suzuki and/or Kotkaniemi to develop into a bona fide top 15-20 center in the league. It's going to need at least 2 D men other than Petry to be true top 4 D men, who can move the puck, play both special teams, and log 20+ minutes a night. Those are hard pieces to acquire by trade unless you're giving up key futures. And hint, they aren't going to be Weber, Kulak, Chiarot, or Edmundson. So our best chance at filling those spots are waiting for our best prospects to turn into those players. And that means not sitting around waiting for our older players to jsut get old and lose all value. We've already done that with Weber. Can't make the same mistake with others.

[Delirium79]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

At this point, I don't have much stress about how the season plays out. We have a pretty decent cushion right now in terms of points/games in hand combo, so if we do manage to blow it, we probably deserve to be out of the playoffs. Worst-case scenario for us right now is to limp into the playoffs and get in because Calgary also craps the bed, then just get tossed around by the Leafs in round 1.

I still have little faith in this team to turn this season around and to win with the current corps. I look at our core group and I ask myself which players are going to get better over time, which will get worse...

- Price: likely going to get worse over time, maybe he has a few small peaks left in his career, but he won't likely get back to being a .930 save percentage goalie who steals games regularly

- Weber: worse. he's been in a free fall decline over the past year and he seems to need two weeks off to be able to put together two strong games in a row.

- Petry: worse in that I doubt he can do better going forward than he's done this year. He was in the Norris discussion for most of the year until lately. Chances he's that good for the next 2-3 years? Unlikely.

- Chiarot, Edmundson, and Kulak all likely to be about the same for the next couple of years.

- Drouin: up and down but not consistent enough to provide much more than he is now. So probably what we see is what we're getting going forward.

- Danault: maybe a bit better than how he started the year, but around the same as what he's giving us now.

- Tatar: age says he's likely going to decline soon

- Gallagher: injuries are probably going to catch up to him at some point.

- Armia: doubt he's even here next year.

- Lehkonen: I think he might need a fresh start to see improvement somewhere else

- Toffoli: I doubt he gives us more than he did this year.

- Perry is in the twilight of his career.

- Staal's career already looks over.

 

So who's likely to give us more? Kotkaniemi and Suzuki are likely to both build on what they've done so far. Romanov should get better with experience. Evans maybe has a bit more to give but likely is not going to be ever be a top 6 player. Anderson I think can still give more. But by and large, we have more guys who are likely to be the same or worse next year and the year after that, and just a handful of current players who are going to get better. So most of the improvement in our club is going to come from guys who aren't yet here. Caufield. Poehling. Ylonen. Norlinder. Harris. Guhle. Struble. Primeau. We have some nice pieces to add to our roster. But now ask yourself when those players will be impact players. I asked this same question maybe 2 years ago, and I talked about how Suzuki and Kotkaniemi and Romanov would add something but how they would need time to integrate and develop. The same can be said about the other guys in our organization outside the NHL, and we all know top-tier D men can take a few years.

My point is that we're not a contender now and we don't really have our ducks lined up to suddenly become a contender next year. Any real chance at contending is going to require Suzuki and/or Kotkaniemi to develop into a bona fide top 15-20 center in the league. It's going to need at least 2 D men other than Petry to be true top 4 D men, who can move the puck, play both special teams, and log 20+ minutes a night. Those are hard pieces to acquire by trade unless you're giving up key futures. And hint, they aren't going to be Weber, Kulak, Chiarot, or Edmundson. So our best chance at filling those spots are waiting for our best prospects to turn into those players. And that means not sitting around waiting for our older players to jsut get old and lose all value. We've already done that with Weber. Can't make the same mistake with others.

Dead on!

[electron58]

Only 4 points up on Flames.  Flames trending in the right direction. Up.

[ChiLla]

2 hours ago, electron58 said:

Only 4 points up on Flames.  Flames trending in the right direction. Up.

Absolutely, and we play them 4 more times in April... These are big games, the boys better be ready.

[claremont]

After watching last night’s game I think they waived the wrong defenseman- I’ve lost so much faith in Weber and his leadership, that I would induce any team Beyond Seattle to take that salary, cap, retention, pay the $6 million for next year, move on etc. 

[Regis22]

Remaining games

Flames 4

Ottawa 3

Edmonton 4

Winnipeg 1

Toronto  4

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they miss the playoffs 

 

[Regis22]

  4

10 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

So who's likely to give us more? Kotkaniemi and Suzuki are likely to both build on what they've done so far. Romanov should get better with experience. Evans maybe has a bit more to give but likely is not going to be ever be a top 6 player. Anderson I think can still give more. But by and large, we have more guys who are likely to be the same or worse next year and the year after that, and just a handful of current players who are going to get better. So most of the improvement in our club is going to come from guys who aren't yet here. Caufield. Poehling. Ylonen. Norlinder. Harris. Guhle. Struble. Primeau. We have some nice pieces to add to our roster. But now ask yourself when those players will be impact players

what do you consider as an impact player ?

[ChiLla]

35 minutes ago, Regis22 said:

Remaining games

Flames 4

Ottawa 3

Edmonton 4

Winnipeg 1

Toronto  4

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they miss the playoffs

Maybe the season will have to end early and we get another free ride to the playoffs

[habby67]

As long as MB is in charge there is no way he’ll let Weber or Price go. By doing this it would suggest he failed and he’ll have none of that. Sad to say but we won’t make a good run at the cup so the team would be better off missing the playoffs and maybe ownership will snap out of it and fire MB and install A president.

[maas_art]

Good article here:Ducharme facing tough decisions spark canadiens team speed

With Merrill and Gustafsson in quarantine and Chairot set to come back, i wonder if DD will consider some load-management for Weber prior to the end of the season.  Whether he's nursing an injury or just gassed, getting him a bit of rest wouldnt be the worst idea.   

 

At some point DD is going to have to make some tough choices -  if he doesnt, the 'interim' part of his title will never be removed imho. 

 

[jennifer_rocket]

Calgary has been eating us all season long.

We have to turn that around with several games against them still to go. They are our toughest competition for fourth place.

[claremont]

28 minutes ago, maas_art said:

Good article here:Ducharme facing tough decisions spark canadiens team speed

With Merrill and Gustafsson in quarantine and Chairot set to come back, i wonder if DD will consider some load-management for Weber prior to the end of the season.  Whether he's nursing an injury or just gassed, getting him a bit of rest wouldnt be the worst idea.   

At some point DD is going to have to make some tough choices -  if he doesnt, the 'interim' part of his title will never be removed imho. 

I read that article earlier and had the same opinion - makes me change my mind about bringing up Caufield a little earlier perhaps. It is a tough choice on a young coach to cut minutes on the older veterans - the younger coaches still revere or are in awe of players like Weber or Staal that the decision becomes even tougher. You only have to look at Toronto with Young Sheldon and see that Slow Thornton is absolutely useless there but continues to play.

[claremont]

13 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

So who's likely to give us more? Kotkaniemi and Suzuki are likely to both build on what they've done so far. Romanov should get better with experience. Evans maybe has a bit more to give but likely is not going to be ever be a top 6 player. Anderson I think can still give more. But by and large, we have more guys who are likely to be the same or worse next year and the year after that, and just a handful of current players who are going to get better. So most of the improvement in our club is going to come from guys who aren't yet here. Caufield. Poehling. Ylonen. Norlinder. Harris. Guhle. Struble. Primeau. We have some nice pieces to add to our roster. But now ask yourself when those players will be impact players. I asked this same question maybe 2 years ago, and I talked about how Suzuki and Kotkaniemi and Romanov would add something but how they would need time to integrate and develop. The same can be said about the other guys in our organization outside the NHL, and we all know top-tier D men can take a few years.

My point is that we're not a contender now and we don't really have our ducks lined up to suddenly become a contender next year. Any real chance at contending is going to require Suzuki and/or Kotkaniemi to develop into a bona fide top 15-20 center in the league. It's going to need at least 2 D men other than Petry to be true top 4 D men, who can move the puck, play both special teams, and log 20+ minutes a night. Those are hard pieces to acquire by trade unless you're giving up key futures. And hint, they aren't going to be Weber, Kulak, Chiarot, or Edmundson. So our best chance at filling those spots are waiting for our best prospects to turn into those players. And that means not sitting around waiting for our older players to jsut get old and lose all value. We've already done that with Weber. Can't make the same mistake with others.

I am going to guess by impact player, you would mean players who would be in the top 5-10 skaters on anyone's team with a top or strong goalie. That is your first 2 lines can score and defend. By my standards, next year we only have 4 - Gallagher, Petry, Anderson, Toffoli and a big maybe in Price as a strong goalie (three of which Gally, JP, Price will only be in that top 10 for next year plus likely 1 more). KK or Suzuki you have correctly indicated as ?'s and the way they lose faceoffs. The way Romanov has performed this year, I believe he can be a 5th (but on the 2nd pairing). The leaves 5 more impact players required which is asking a lot of Caufield out of the gate as a 6th. We've all talked about the need for a strong LHD, and a strong centre (I don't think we have the bananas and cap room to throw at Eichel). So yes from being a true contender we need to get rid of a number of ill fitting pieces and have some significant surprises. 

[H_T_L]

From TSN,,,,

The Calgary Flames pulled to within three points of the Montreal Canadiens in the race for the final North Division playoff spot with their 4-1 win on Wednesday. Though the Canadiens have three games in hand on Calgary, centre Nick Suzuki pushed the team for urgency.

I'm guessing math is not a pre requisite to work for TSN

[habs1952]

15 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

At this point, I don't have much stress about how the season plays out. We have a pretty decent cushion right now in terms of points/games in hand combo, so if we do manage to blow it, we probably deserve to be out of the playoffs. Worst-case scenario for us right now is to limp into the playoffs and get in because Calgary also craps the bed, then just get tossed around by the Leafs in round 1.

I still have little faith in this team to turn this season around and to win with the current corps. I look at our core group and I ask myself which players are going to get better over time, which will get worse...

- Price: likely going to get worse over time, maybe he has a few small peaks left in his career, but he won't likely get back to being a .930 save percentage goalie who steals games regularly

- Weber: worse. he's been in a free fall decline over the past year and he seems to need two weeks off to be able to put together two strong games in a row.

- Petry: worse in that I doubt he can do better going forward than he's done this year. He was in the Norris discussion for most of the year until lately. Chances he's that good for the next 2-3 years? Unlikely.

- Chiarot, Edmundson, and Kulak all likely to be about the same for the next couple of years.

- Drouin: up and down but not consistent enough to provide much more than he is now. So probably what we see is what we're getting going forward.

- Danault: maybe a bit better than how he started the year, but around the same as what he's giving us now.

- Tatar: age says he's likely going to decline soon

- Gallagher: injuries are probably going to catch up to him at some point.

- Armia: doubt he's even here next year.

- Lehkonen: I think he might need a fresh start to see improvement somewhere else

- Toffoli: I doubt he gives us more than he did this year.

- Perry is in the twilight of his career.

- Staal's career already looks over.

 

 

It's gonna take years to get out of this mess. Heck, JK and Suzuki will be in their 30's before we get there.

[richard464]

15 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

At this point, I don't have much stress about how the season plays out. We have a pretty decent cushion right now in terms of points/games in hand combo, so if we do manage to blow it, we probably deserve to be out of the playoffs. Worst-case scenario for us right now is to limp into the playoffs and get in because Calgary also craps the bed, then just get tossed around by the Leafs in round 1.

I still have little faith in this team to turn this season around and to win with the current corps. I look at our core group and I ask myself which players are going to get better over time, which will get worse...

- Price: likely going to get worse over time, maybe he has a few small peaks left in his career, but he won't likely get back to being a .930 save percentage goalie who steals games regularly

- Weber: worse. he's been in a free fall decline over the past year and he seems to need two weeks off to be able to put together two strong games in a row.

- Petry: worse in that I doubt he can do better going forward than he's done this year. He was in the Norris discussion for most of the year until lately. Chances he's that good for the next 2-3 years? Unlikely.

- Chiarot, Edmundson, and Kulak all likely to be about the same for the next couple of years.

- Drouin: up and down but not consistent enough to provide much more than he is now. So probably what we see is what we're getting going forward.

- Danault: maybe a bit better than how he started the year, but around the same as what he's giving us now.

- Tatar: age says he's likely going to decline soon

- Gallagher: injuries are probably going to catch up to him at some point.

- Armia: doubt he's even here next year.

- Lehkonen: I think he might need a fresh start to see improvement somewhere else

- Toffoli: I doubt he gives us more than he did this year.

- Perry is in the twilight of his career.

- Staal's career already looks over.

 

So who's likely to give us more? Kotkaniemi and Suzuki are likely to both build on what they've done so far. Romanov should get better with experience. Evans maybe has a bit more to give but likely is not going to be ever be a top 6 player. Anderson I think can still give more. But by and large, we have more guys who are likely to be the same or worse next year and the year after that, and just a handful of current players who are going to get better. So most of the improvement in our club is going to come from guys who aren't yet here. Caufield. Poehling. Ylonen. Norlinder. Harris. Guhle. Struble. Primeau. We have some nice pieces to add to our roster. But now ask yourself when those players will be impact players. I asked this same question maybe 2 years ago, and I talked about how Suzuki and Kotkaniemi and Romanov would add something but how they would need time to integrate and develop. The same can be said about the other guys in our organization outside the NHL, and we all know top-tier D men can take a few years.

My point is that we're not a contender now and we don't really have our ducks lined up to suddenly become a contender next year. Any real chance at contending is going to require Suzuki and/or Kotkaniemi to develop into a bona fide top 15-20 center in the league. It's going to need at least 2 D men other than Petry to be true top 4 D men, who can move the puck, play both special teams, and log 20+ minutes a night. Those are hard pieces to acquire by trade unless you're giving up key futures. And hint, they aren't going to be Weber, Kulak, Chiarot, or Edmundson. So our best chance at filling those spots are waiting for our best prospects to turn into those players. And that means not sitting around waiting for our older players to jsut get old and lose all value. We've already done that with Weber. Can't make the same mistake with others.

The Canadiens francise is a business. It needs to be operated like any other business. I can assure you that there are not too many business owners that would build their business on a promise of one million dollars of purchase orders over the next two years. Based on that this business cannot be built on the promise of young talent that has been signed. These prospects are based on statistics that show 37% of first round picks will play less than 200 games in the NHL. That changes to 70% for second rounders and 89% for fifth+. There are no guarantees here so relying on our best prospects does not create a feeling of a prosperous future. It takes good management and that is one thing this franchise does not have at this time. This includes owner through the coach.

In 2018 Dubas took over the reigns in Toronto. He took a floundering team that had a record of 46-28-100pts to the team on the ice today. They are a contending team for sure depsite the fact that they have weaknesses that any good qualified coach could exploit. However the fact remains that in the time he became the Mgr he has blown past Bergevin who is considered by many as being a very smart individual. He knew where the holes were and he went ahead and filled them. Yes he has added some wiley veterans but they are doing the job they are being paid for. He is a smart guy and while he was here in the Sault he built a real strong Jr "A" franchise in less than three years. We all knew he was destined to the NHL and he has since shown just how knowledgable he is in regards to talent and the analytics that are required to plan ahead. MB is an old style manager that feels more comfortable keeping around the old guard and not taking the risk. He made a couple of great moves over the summer with Toffoli & Anderson but Stahl & Perry are questionable. However in Perry's defence he has scored more goals than our infamous #92. When you look at the overall production of the new guys they have scored 43 goals. (Tofolli, Anderson,Perry) The combination of (Suzuki,Gallagher,KK,Drouin,Danault, Byron,Lecky) have scored 40 goals. So where would we be without those moves.If we are going to "wait for our best prospects to fill in the holes" then this franchise will continue to flounder around for many year to come. What has to happen is MB has to pack his suitcase and we need to bring in manager that is in tune with today's talent and is able to take the opportunity when it is there to build the team now. We also need a good coach and we should be choosing from across the field not just french speaking individuals. I am not sure but that in today's environment has some racist tones to it. He had many opportunities to trade off Price I am sure but declined. From what I have seen Carey is on a steep slope along with Weber, Chiarot, Edmunson etc.

Although the post from "BigTed" is on the money, I do not beleive that we should be relying too heavily on our prospects. It is not too difficult to find the stats on a great number of top prospects that fell on their face in the big arena. There needs to be a good mix of solid veterans and young prospects to make this work. The fans are not going to accept waiting around another 10 years for this team to become a contender. An early start to this taking place is for MB to find a new home.

[maas_art]

25 minutes ago, richard464 said:

In 2018 Dubas took over the reigns in Toronto. He took a floundering team that had a record of 46-28-100pts to the team on the ice today. They are a contending team for sure depsite the fact that they have weaknesses that any good qualified coach could exploit. However the fact remains that in the time he became the Mgr he has blown past Bergevin who is considered by many as being a very smart individual.

He (Dubas) also inherited a roster that included: Matthews (1st overall), Marner (4th), Rielly (5th), Nylander (8th)

Im not defending MB because he's made some very bad decisions (like not moving players when their value was high and we were clearly not contenders, or filling holes in the roster just to create other ones) but I think we'd be a diffent team with that many high draft picks.   They even had a couple of others from a few years earlier (Kadri and Schenn)

[richard464]

21 minutes ago, maas_art said:

He (Dubas) also inherited a roster that included: Matthews (1st overall), Marner (4th), Rielly (5th), Nylander (8th)

Im not defending MB because he's made some very bad decisions (like not moving players when their value was high and we were clearly not contenders, or filling holes in the roster just to create other ones) but I think we'd be a diffent team with that many high draft picks.   They even had a couple of others from a few years earlier (Kadri and Schenn)

Very true but they did not arrive there by means of the stork! We have never had a first overall with the highest being 3rd in the first round in the history of the draft. Galchenyuk & KK. So what makes that happen? Why were the Leafs able to put this together and we were not? Bergevin that's why! Also Molson is too busy with his beer industry and could care less what the hell the hockey team is doing!

[caperns61]

1 hour ago, richard464 said:

Very true but they did not arrive there by means of the stork! We have never had a first overall with the highest being 3rd in the first round in the history of the draft. Galchenyuk & KK. So what makes that happen? Why were the Leafs able to put this together and we were not? Bergevin that's why! Also Molson is too busy with his beer industry and could care less what the hell the hockey team is doing!

Because they won a draft lottery and we didnt.