2020-2021 Toronto Maple Leafs General Discussion
- Thread starter herman
- Start date
Highlander
Active member
Looks like our Leafs are going for it next year 
Phileas Fogg
New member
Guilt Trip said:
Yeah, my only concern with Thornton apart from age/quickness/load management is that he needs someone else on his line that's capable of making higher level plays.. the biggest positive I think he'll bring is on PP2 and he'd be the perfect guy to throw over the boards as the 6th player with the goalie pulled to play with the Matthews/Marner/Tavares show. He can protect the puck as well as anyone in the offensive zone.
https://twitter.com/mapleleafs/status/1317597711173079040
Guilt Trip
Active member
Let's hope more Richardson, less Zaitsev with a lil Tiger on the side!L K said:
herman
Well-known member
herman said:
Aaron Dell signing: yay (for the Frozen memes)
Joe Thornton signing: kewl
And since others added this:
Draft: yay
Media is going to play it this way, but I don?t think Dubas really pivoted or changed his mind on how teams are built. If you look at his Soo and Marlies builds, it?s always been skill insulated by veterans and b-holes with some skill.
The way I see it: Dubas inherited/helped build a skilled core and added his skilled Marlies core that was developed as complementary pieces and saw how far it went. Locking the big three down to long term before any other term in the lineup is added was crucial*, as was taking time to see what their limits and gaps were. Similar to the Babcock situation, the first round or less seemed to be the threshold.
Finally free of some hefty cap anchors, he parlayed his middle class (that the pandemic made too expensive for us) for balance and continued to supplement the team with cheapos. The pandemic took away Kapanen and Johnsson?s scoring, but gifted more opportunity to net higher end cheapos. Playing alongside the likes of Matthews, Tavares, Marner, and Nylander are a draw for players who suffered poor shooting luck the previous season, or want to rebound from a buyout.
The draft leaning into high end skill pieces as usual is Dubas looking to add new core pieces as incumbents age or price out of viability, e.g. the types of players that command a premium in trades and free agency. Anything else can eventually be found by alternative acquisition.
Mistakes have been made (they are inevitable), but they have not been mistakes of the decision making process (Sparks/McElhinney, Barrie). They were all short term issues as well, to be rectified with another try at the deadline or the off-season. The team is turning a corner.
* see Islanders, Vancouver as examples of teams who focused too early on insulation grit and veteran savvy at a premium and now struggle to accommodate their actual success drivers.
Heroic Shrimp
Active member
https://twitter.com/Zeisberger/status/1317852941236211712
Heroic Shrimp
Active member
https://twitter.com/Zeisberger has all the snippets from the 11am Dubas/Thornton presser if you want them on the fly. Obviously will get summarized soon enough.
Heroic Shrimp
Active member
https://twitter.com/sunhornby/status/1317853341951602691
Heroic Shrimp said:
They'll have about $3mil to split between these two guys. If Mikheyev gets awarded a fairly small amount in arbitration, like just $1mil, I could see Dermott essentially having two options on the table: take your qualifying offer for a 1-year deal or take $2mil on a 3 year deal.
Guilt Trip
Active member
PP2Bullfrog said:
Guilt Trip said:
PP2 is just gonna be Thornton and Spezza passing it back and forth for 40 seconds before one of them banks it off Simmonds and into the net.