2021-22 State of the Habs

[CaptWelly]

1 hour ago, maas_art said:

Agree. While I dont put as much stock in advanced stats as some, having all the info is key. Just to ignore it like the old regime is foolhardy.

I realize that teams built on Sabermetrics tend not to be winners but that doesnt mean that there isnt useful information there to be presented alongside tradtional methods of evaluation. 

I agree it's good to have additional information but Hockey has proven to be a sport that advances stats only go so far. Remember a few years back thats how Arizona was building their team on metrics .........worked out great so far!!!

[kinot-2]

Montreal Canadiens general manager Kent Hughes announced on Friday the appointment of Christopher Boucher as Director of Hockey Analytics. Boucher becomes the first person to hold this position in Canadiens history.

Among his duties, Boucher will assist management and the coaching staff by providing relevant statistical data to help them evaluate players and make strategic decisions.

[Regis22]

Character can only take you so far ....lol

[BigTed3]

So is this the off-season the Leafs finally make a move to shake up their core? Have to think they're unlikely to move any of Matthews, Marner, and Rielly and that Tavares would be difficult to move, but Nylander seems to be a constant whipping boy and the most likely to move. So I'll just throw this out here:

1. Nylander for Anderson. Who says no, keeping in mind the Leafs don't feel Nylander is committed enough and might want to change the style of play they're getting and the Habs are searching for someone to play with Suzuki and Caufield?

2. Nylander for Petry and Edmonton's 2nd. Who says no, keeping in mind Dubas is a believer in advanced stats and Petry has always been an advanced stats darling and keeping in mind that the Leafs are in win-now mode?

From our view, I think Nylander offers great value, but you have to think Toronto might oversell here based on the need to change something up.

[habsisme]

26 minutes ago, BigTed3 said:

So is this the off-season the Leafs finally make a move to shake up their core? Have to think they're unlikely to move any of Matthews, Marner, and Rielly and that Tavares would be difficult to move, but Nylander seems to be a constant whipping boy and the most likely to move. So I'll just throw this out here:

1. Nylander for Anderson. Who says no, keeping in mind the Leafs don't feel Nylander is committed enough and might want to change the style of play they're getting and the Habs are searching for someone to play with Suzuki and Caufield?

2. Nylander for Petry and Edmonton's 2nd. Who says no, keeping in mind Dubas is a believer in advanced stats and Petry has always been an advanced stats darling and keeping in mind that the Leafs are in win-now mode?

From our view, I think Nylander offers great value, but you have to think Toronto might oversell here based on the need to change something up.

I dont think they would make a trade with us unless we really overpaid but I would like Nylander for sure. The thing is I think the leafs need to give up a player and not take salary back if they're going to sign Campbell. So they would want a nice piece thats cheap and probably futures for Nylander cause even though they're in win-now mode, they don't have the cap space. Only guy I think could be interesting is Drouin with salary retained but that's just not much value to build a trade around for nylander, but maybe Calgary's first? I still think you'd need more. 

I want to rebuild completely but Nylander would definiterly be a good add

[Graeme-1]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

So is this the off-season the Leafs finally make a move to shake up their core? Have to think they're unlikely to move any of Matthews, Marner, and Rielly and that Tavares would be difficult to move, but Nylander seems to be a constant whipping boy and the most likely to move. So I'll just throw this out here:

1. Nylander for Anderson. Who says no, keeping in mind the Leafs don't feel Nylander is committed enough and might want to change the style of play they're getting and the Habs are searching for someone to play with Suzuki and Caufield?

2. Nylander for Petry and Edmonton's 2nd. Who says no, keeping in mind Dubas is a believer in advanced stats and Petry has always been an advanced stats darling and keeping in mind that the Leafs are in win-now mode?

From our view, I think Nylander offers great value, but you have to think Toronto might oversell here based on the need to change something up.

I actually think it's less likely this time: arguably Toronto outplayed Tampa, the core contributed in a big way, and they lost to the raining cup champions in a close Game 7.  It's nothing like last year when there was a good argument to shake something up.

It's possible the Leafs overreact, but what I saw of that Tampa series screams "run it back again".

[CaptWelly]

8 hours ago, Graeme-1 said:

I actually think it's less likely this time: arguably Toronto outplayed Tampa, the core contributed in a big way, and they lost to the raining cup champions in a close Game 7.  It's nothing like last year when there was a good argument to shake something up.

It's possible the Leafs overreact, but what I saw of that Tampa series screams "run it back again".

I agree they did out play them and the Leafs like them or not got totally ripped off in game 6 with tow bad penalty calls causing the 5 on 3. Then the refs didn't look good in game 7 either truthfully. You know the league would love to see a Florida conference finals. 

[electron58]

2 hours ago, CaptWelly said:

I agree they did out play them and the Leafs like them or not got totally ripped off in game 6 with two bad penalty calls causing the 5 on 3. Then the refs didn't look good in game 7 either truthfully. You know the league would love to see a Florida conference finals. 

I noticed that too!  What obvious biased calls. Exactly right on the Florida State Finals. American or nothing! 

[electron58]

12 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

Nylander for Anderson. Who says no, keeping in mind the Leafs don't feel Nylander is committed enough and might want to change the style of play they're getting and the Habs are searching for someone to play with Suzuki and Caufield?

2. Nylander for Petry and Edmonton's 2nd. Who says no, keeping in mind Dubas is a believer in advanced stats and Petry has always been an advanced stats darling and keeping in mind that the Leafs are in win-now mode?

From our view, I think Nylander offers great value, but you have to think Toronto might oversell here based on the need to change something up.

 

12 hours ago, habsisme said:

I don't think they would make a trade with us unless we really overpaid but I would like Nylander for sure. The thing is I think the Leafs need to give up a player and not take salary back if they're going to sign Campbell. So they would want a nice piece that's cheap and probably futures for Nylander cause even though they're in win-now mode, they don't have the cap space. Only guy I think could be interesting is Drouin with salary retained but that's just not much value to build a trade around for Nylander, but maybe Calgary's first? I still think you'd need more. I want to rebuild completely but Nylander would definitely be a good add.

I'm with you on option 1. William Nylander brings a different dynamic to the Habs. Would we miss Josh Anderson?  Maybe. But you have to give, to get. The Leafs will have a few players coming off their books, and will bring in players on entry level contracts. William Nylander's annual cap hit is $6,962,366. Josh Anderson's annual cap hit is $5,500,000. So Leafs save 1.5M right away & get tougher. I don't think that Jeff Petry will be traded to a Canadian Team. Period.

So, as much as it is wishful thinking, I don't think the Leafs do either trade. I believe, if William Nylander gets traded, it will be for a stud defenseman, a la Jakub Chychrun, who carries an annual cap hit of $4,600,000.

[jennifer_rocket]

I think the Leafs keep the core of Matthews, Marner, Tavares, and Nylander together for next season. I think it'll be more tinkering from Dubas instead making a big move. They've got $7-8 million in cap space they can spend in the off-season. Will probably need a new goaltender.

[habsisme]

8 minutes ago, jennifer_rocket said:

I think the Leafs keep the core of Matthews, Marner, Tavares, and Nylander together for next season. I think it'll be more tinkering from Dubas instead making a big move. They've got $7-8 million in cap space they can spend in the off-season. Will probably need a new goaltender.

Not really because they have 6 open spots and no starting goalie. They need to move money out if they want to keep Campbell

[claremont]

15 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

So is this the off-season the Leafs finally make a move to shake up their core? Have to think they're unlikely to move any of Matthews, Marner, and Rielly and that Tavares would be difficult to move, but Nylander seems to be a constant whipping boy and the most likely to move. So I'll just throw this out here:

1. Nylander for Anderson. Who says no, keeping in mind the Leafs don't feel Nylander is committed enough and might want to change the style of play they're getting and the Habs are searching for someone to play with Suzuki and Caufield?

2. Nylander for Petry and Edmonton's 2nd. Who says no, keeping in mind Dubas is a believer in advanced stats and Petry has always been an advanced stats darling and keeping in mind that the Leafs are in win-now mode?

From our view, I think Nylander offers great value, but you have to think Toronto might oversell here based on the need to change something up.

I don’t see Nylander being traded within the division and possibly coming back to haunt them. I do believe Nylander will be the scapegoat for change despite Marners tendency from his London Knights days to disappear in tough games and Tavares incredibly poor playoff record - the latter 2 are very tough contracts to inherit. Much like Demar DeRozan with the Raptors there are players that help you get to the playoffs vs those that get you thru the playoffs hence the Raptors traded away DeRozan for Leonard. All 3 of them fall into the DeRozan mold. 
Nylander would help the Habs from a scoring perspective but I think the fan base would get tired of his soft corner antics just as much as Domi’s ability to take dumb penalties. Nylander is a polarizing player - Josh Anderson is not but if we gave up assets it would be option 2 for me. 
 

[BigTed3]

Sure, the Leafs had a good roster and could have won that series against TB. But we've also been talking about how good Matthews and Marner and company have been for years and they have nothing to show for it. It's not like they made a run to the ECF one year and then just fell short this season. This team still hasn't made it out of the 1st round. Tavares is already 31, declining, and making 11M a season. Between Marner, Tavares, and Matthews, they're eating up 33.5M against the salary cap. Rielly's salary jumps to 7.5M next year, Muzzin is making 5.6M, Brodie 5M, and Nylander 6.9M. Mrazek is a back-up goalie making 3.8M. And of all those players, only Marner, Matthews, and Nylander don't have some form of trade protection. To boot, the Leafs have traded away so many picks that they only had 3 last year with no first rounder, 3 this year, and 5 in 2023. They're running out of assets to deal away to help their roster, they don't have a ton of cap flexibility, and they haven't gotten over the hump with what they have. So yeah, they can talk about running it back next season and they'll probably still be a good team that makes the playoffs, but past that, how close are they to contending for a Cup? How many years in a row can you "run it back" with the same corps before making a substantial change? I do think Nylander is made the scapegoat more than he should be, but he's the one guy that makes significant money and has no trade protection that they can slide out to change up the composition of their roster. So I do think there's a reasonable chance Dubas moves him this off-season. I just think we've hit the point that something has to give. And with Toronto having no 2nd rounder this year and our having two, there could be a fit there for us to swap wingers with them and maybe toss in Edmonton's 2nd rounder if we need to.

[CaptWelly]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

Sure, the Leafs had a good roster and could have won that series against TB. But we've also been talking about how good Matthews and Marner and company have been for years and they have nothing to show for it. It's not like they made a run to the ECF one year and then just fell short this season. This team still hasn't made it out of the 1st round. Tavares is already 31, declining, and making 11M a season. Between Marner, Tavares, and Matthews, they're eating up 33.5M against the salary cap. Rielly's salary jumps to 7.5M next year, Muzzin is making 5.6M, Brodie 5M, and Nylander 6.9M. Mrazek is a back-up goalie making 3.8M. And of all those players, only Marner, Matthews, and Nylander don't have some form of trade protection. To boot, the Leafs have traded away so many picks that they only had 3 last year with no first rounder, 3 this year, and 5 in 2023. They're running out of assets to deal away to help their roster, they don't have a ton of cap flexibility, and they haven't gotten over the hump with what they have. So yeah, they can talk about running it back next season and they'll probably still be a good team that makes the playoffs, but past that, how close are they to contending for a Cup? How many years in a row can you "run it back" with the same corps before making a substantial change? I do think Nylander is made the scapegoat more than he should be, but he's the one guy that makes significant money and has no trade protection that they can slide out to change up the composition of their roster. So I do think there's a reasonable chance Dubas moves him this off-season. I just think we've hit the point that something has to give. And with Toronto having no 2nd rounder this year and our having two, there could be a fit there for us to swap wingers with them and maybe toss in Edmonton's 2nd rounder if we need to.

I really doubt they'll panic or make significant changes. They got beat by Tampa who still has the possibilities to win it all. Edmonton barely got by LA a weaker team without Doughty and others. Tampa does have the experience and a great goaltender and defense and top scorers and forwards. Also they don't panic at all and are very experienced. 

Tavares actually had a really good series. Yes you have to find a way to win. That said a really good team was going to lose in this round just by the way the standings fell. The Eastern conference this year doesn't have any easy paths. Say what you want but the refs did make some questionable calls. 

Anyway if Tampa goes on to win or goes down in the Stanely cup people may look at this lose differently. 

[Graeme-1]

16 hours ago, Graeme-1 said:

I actually think it's less likely this time: arguably Toronto outplayed Tampa, the core contributed in a big way, and they lost to the raining cup champions in a close Game 7.  It's nothing like last year when there was a good argument to shake something up.

It's possible the Leafs overreact, but what I saw of that Tampa series screams "run it back again".

lol good lesson not to post when tired: in another thread I said Bergeven instead of Bergeron and here I mixed up rain and reign

[Graeme-1]

1 hour ago, BigTed3 said:

Sure, the Leafs had a good roster and could have won that series against TB. But we've also been talking about how good Matthews and Marner and company have been for years and they have nothing to show for it. It's not like they made a run to the ECF one year and then just fell short this season. This team still hasn't made it out of the 1st round. Tavares is already 31, declining, and making 11M a season. Between Marner, Tavares, and Matthews, they're eating up 33.5M against the salary cap. Rielly's salary jumps to 7.5M next year, Muzzin is making 5.6M, Brodie 5M, and Nylander 6.9M. Mrazek is a back-up goalie making 3.8M. And of all those players, only Marner, Matthews, and Nylander don't have some form of trade protection. To boot, the Leafs have traded away so many picks that they only had 3 last year with no first rounder, 3 this year, and 5 in 2023. They're running out of assets to deal away to help their roster, they don't have a ton of cap flexibility, and they haven't gotten over the hump with what they have. So yeah, they can talk about running it back next season and they'll probably still be a good team that makes the playoffs, but past that, how close are they to contending for a Cup? How many years in a row can you "run it back" with the same corps before making a substantial change? I do think Nylander is made the scapegoat more than he should be, but he's the one guy that makes significant money and has no trade protection that they can slide out to change up the composition of their roster. So I do think there's a reasonable chance Dubas moves him this off-season. I just think we've hit the point that something has to give. And with Toronto having no 2nd rounder this year and our having two, there could be a fit there for us to swap wingers with them and maybe toss in Edmonton's 2nd rounder if we need to.

The problem is lumping this year in with previous years. Had the core disappeared once again, it would be a clear pattern and throwing a wrench into the mix and trying to do something to shake it up would seem like a logical response (after last year, while it would have been a mistake, the temptation to shake things up was understandable). After this year though, where the team played great, the core looked great, and honestly they got a bit screwed, what would shaking up the core accomplish beyond venting steam?  I suppose you could argue this year was an anomaly and previous seasons were the real Leafs core, but I think the argument that they finally figured it out and just got unlucky is a lot stronger. And I also think Toronto's front office is smart enough to avoid the impulse to just try something.

Of course, if they got a great offer for one of their players, I'm sure they'd consider it. And they probably wouldn't mind getting out of the Tavares contract, but I don't see them desperately trying to unload anyone.

[maas_art]

10 hours ago, jennifer_rocket said:

I think the Leafs keep the core of Matthews, Marner, Tavares, and Nylander together for next season. I think it'll be more tinkering from Dubas instead making a big move. They've got $7-8 million in cap space they can spend in the off-season. Will probably need a new goaltender.

If they do keep that core, Id be more than interested in Morgan Rielly who starts his new contract in July (does that mean the NMC hasnt kicked in?) and will be locked up for a looong time ;)  

[jennifer_rocket]

19 hours ago, habsisme said:

Not really because they have 6 open spots and no starting goalie. They need to move money out if they want to keep Campbell

I don't know if they'll elect to keep Campbell or look elsewhere. He's already 30 years old. And he's an average goaltender, IMO. I think they'll look to free agency to pick up someone else. I doubt they'll spend big on the position.

I see that they need a few bottom-six forwards and a couple of defenders.

[jennifer_rocket]

17 hours ago, BigTed3 said:

Sure, the Leafs had a good roster and could have won that series against TB. But we've also been talking about how good Matthews and Marner and company have been for years and they have nothing to show for it. It's not like they made a run to the ECF one year and then just fell short this season. This team still hasn't made it out of the 1st round. Tavares is already 31, declining, and making 11M a season. Between Marner, Tavares, and Matthews, they're eating up 33.5M against the salary cap. Rielly's salary jumps to 7.5M next year, Muzzin is making 5.6M, Brodie 5M, and Nylander 6.9M. Mrazek is a back-up goalie making 3.8M. And of all those players, only Marner, Matthews, and Nylander don't have some form of trade protection. To boot, the Leafs have traded away so many picks that they only had 3 last year with no first rounder, 3 this year, and 5 in 2023. They're running out of assets to deal away to help their roster, they don't have a ton of cap flexibility, and they haven't gotten over the hump with what they have. So yeah, they can talk about running it back next season and they'll probably still be a good team that makes the playoffs, but past that, how close are they to contending for a Cup? How many years in a row can you "run it back" with the same corps before making a substantial change? I do think Nylander is made the scapegoat more than he should be, but he's the one guy that makes significant money and has no trade protection that they can slide out to change up the composition of their roster. So I do think there's a reasonable chance Dubas moves him this off-season. I just think we've hit the point that something has to give. And with Toronto having no 2nd rounder this year and our having two, there could be a fit there for us to swap wingers with them and maybe toss in Edmonton's 2nd rounder if we need to.

I just don't see how you can move Nylander at $6.9 per season. Whatever came back the other way, I just don't feel like it would commensurate in value. I understand that he would have a good deal of trade value, but I just don't think you'll get back something that makes the Leafs better than they already are.

[campabee82]

9 hours ago, maas_art said:

If they do keep that core, Id be more than interested in Morgan Rielly who starts his new contract in July (does that mean the NMC hasnt kicked in?) and will be locked up for a looong time ;)  

To answer your question, Reilly's last contract had a NMC for the last two years therefore his NMC actually kicked in in the 2020-21 season. So he won't be being traded.

[kinot-2]

Montreal Canadiens goaltender Carey Price is one of three finalists for the 2022 Masterton Trophy, awarded to the NHL player who "best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship and dedication to the game."

[maas_art]

2 hours ago, kinot-2 said:

Montreal Canadiens goaltender Carey Price is one of three finalists for the 2022 Masterton Trophy, awarded to the NHL player who "best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship and dedication to the game."

Pretty good chance Price wins. Its between him and Hayes imho.  Chara is only nominated because he's old and has broken some age/season related records.  

Hayes had a blood clot, a few surgeries and his brother died... thats a lot in one season. Id say its his award to lose but the thing about Price is that he is one of the first active players - certainly superstars - to be reall open about dealing with substance abuse and other things.   

Not like its a really major award or anything but still interesting to see which way they go. Either is deserving. 

[kinot-2]

Canadiens' Josh Anderson picks up two assists in Team Canada win

He now has points in all three games Canada has played — all victories — with 1-4-5 totals and is plus-5.

[BigTed3]

Philip Danault the latest former Hab to speak out against the prior Habs regime and say it's nice to play in a system now where every little mistake you make isn't pointed out to you and you aren't punished for them. This from a guy who had more leash than most players. Doesn't say much for Therrien, Julien, Ducharme, or Bergevin here.

[maas_art]

12 minutes ago, BigTed3 said:

Philip Danault the latest former Hab to speak out against the prior Habs regime and say it's nice to play in a system now where every little mistake you make isn't pointed out to you and you aren't punished for them. This from a guy who had more leash than most players. Doesn't say much for Therrien, Julien, Ducharme, or Bergevin here.

Yeah, yikes.  If PD is speaking out against the system you're in trouble because a) he was given a lot of rope and b) he plays a simple game with very few mistakes.  If he felt it was an inhospitable situation I can only imagine what the young guys must have felt.