2024 Offseason Thread: Changes

[Guru Tugginmypuddah]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

100% with CW on this.  Draft Shmaft philosophy and trading away prospects leaves the team with no cheap talent.  Instead they have to overpay mediocre FA and watch rentals they traded picks and prospects for leave in the off season. 

Instead, they have no picks, no prospects and have to look at trading and or letting their elite player walk into FA to try to improve the team.

It's nuts. 

 

[cabber24]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

 

[Joe S.]

If they do trade Marner, Leaf fans will have driven another star out of town and it will be all our fault. All of us, cause to the rest of the world, every single Leaf fan is the exact same in every way.

Just to be clear, from my perspective I don?t think the fans play a role in what the leafs decide to do or try to do, and if they do then that?s stupid.

My comment is just the general comments from fans who just want to toss him to the curb.

 

[Joe S.]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

It?s doesn?t matter how you pay for them because there hasn?t been a high profile goalie to hit the free agent market in forever and they never drafted one where they could control the salary for a number of years. So there?s no point to your point.

 

[cabber24]

agent market in forever a

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

It?s doesn?t matter how you pay for them because there hasn?t been a high profile goalie to hit the free agent market in forever and they never drafted one where they could control the salary for a number of years. So there?s no point to your point.

What's YOUR point? Pay the guy $13M and trade everything for cap retention for half solutions and rewatch for the 9th time?

 

[Bill_Berg]

If they do trade Marner, Leaf fans will have driven another star out of town and it will be all our fault. All of us, cause to the rest of the world, every single Leaf fan is the exact same in every way.

Just to be clear, from my perspective I don?t think the fans play a role in what the leafs decide to do or try to do, and if they do then that?s stupid.

My comment is just the general comments from fans who just want to toss him to the curb.

Your comment is based on logic. I'm talking about the false narrative that will surely arise: Leaf fans drove Marner out of town because we're all dumb and don't appreciate what we've got.

I do agree with Cabber that there is too much money allocated to the forwards and not enough left for D and a goalie. Now maybe that's not fixable this year with what's available, but it's undoubtedly a problem. Marner is the only one of the core four that could even possibly be moved, that's why the narrative is around him.

 

[cw]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

They have $19.4 mil in cap space this season
and between $40-50 mil next season.
They have more cap space/roster spot than many of the contenders.

Potentially. they can get 2 decent UFA dmen this summer with a decent backup.
Next summer there might be some decent UFA goalies available if they need them.

They have to look at things like that because it is too late to draft and develop much to help Matthews Cup runs in the next 4 years. They're past "ideal world roster development". The window for winning with Matthews et al is probably closing in the next few years. So that is how they have to look at it.

Instead of burning draft picks at the deadline, they should over pay a little to get some young economical guys on the roster who will be able to contribute in the near future. Roll the future assets into the present - but not with assets that are gone July 1. Get some more mileage out of younger players.

The other thing they can do, as I've mentioned before, is use some of MLSE money to beat the bushes all over the planet to try and find a couple of economical guys like Benoit & McMann to help make up for their lack of prospects/picks.

I do not think it is rocket science to figure this out. The circumstances are fairly clear. I'm sure Leafs management is way ahead of me on this. They know. It is not that hard. To me, aside from the burning of draft picks on rentals, I like their position for the next 2 seasons - particularly '25-26.

 

[Joe S.]

agent market in forever a

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

It?s doesn?t matter how you pay for them because there hasn?t been a high profile goalie to hit the free agent market in forever and they never drafted one where they could control the salary for a number of years. So there?s no point to your point.

What's YOUR point? Pay the guy $13M and trade everything for cap retention for half solutions and rewatch for the 9th time?

I mean you?re moving the goalposts.  Read my post again. It?s not that complicated. I never brought up salaries. You did.

 

[Bill_Berg]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

They have $19.4 mil in cap space this season
and between $40-50 mil next season.
They have more cap space/roster spot than many of the contenders.

Potentially. they can get 2 decent UFA dmen this summer with a decent backup.
Next summer there might be some decent UFA goalies available if they need them.

They have to look at things like that because it is too late to draft and develop much to help Matthews Cup runs in the next 4 years. They're past "ideal world roster development". The window for winning with Matthews et al is probably closing in the next few years. So that is how they have to look at it.

Instead of burning draft picks at the deadline, they should over pay a little to get some young economical guys on the roster who will be able to contribute in the near future. Roll the future assets into the present - but not with assets that are gone July 1. Get some more mileage out of younger players.

The other thing they can do, as I've mentioned before, is use some of MLSE money to beat the bushes all over the planet to try and find a couple of economical guys like Benoit & McMann to help make up for their lack of prospects/picks.

I do not think it is rocket science to figure this out. The circumstances are fairly clear. I'm sure Leafs management is way ahead of me on this. They know. It is not that hard. To me, aside from the burning of draft picks on rentals, I like their position for the next 2 seasons - particularly '25-26.

19 million for 2 top D, a solid backup, and fill out the forwards? I dunno. That leaves a potential giant hole in net.

Didn't put much thought into this but...

Montour 8 million
Pesce 5 million
Brossoit 3? million

Doesn't leave much for Domi, Betuzzi, or their replacements.

 

[herman]

The dispute isn't whether Marner is a bad player or not (he's very good), but it's a) the unbalanced allocation of finite resources, b) playstyle when it counts the most, and c) future value. On all three counts, there is a significant argument that retaining the premium talent of Mitch Marner at his demanded price will be detrimental to playoff success going forward.

This isn't the Leafs throwing away homegrown skill while the roster is bereft of skill. There is still a very strong core in Matthews, Nylander, Knies, Rielly (sort of), and Woll (injury concerns aside) that we would ideally like to add a centre and another defenseman to. The re-balancing should've been taken care of last offseason.

 

[cw]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

They have $19.4 mil in cap space this season
and between $40-50 mil next season.
They have more cap space/roster spot than many of the contenders.

Potentially. they can get 2 decent UFA dmen this summer with a decent backup.
Next summer there might be some decent UFA goalies available if they need them.

They have to look at things like that because it is too late to draft and develop much to help Matthews Cup runs in the next 4 years. They're past "ideal world roster development". The window for winning with Matthews et al is probably closing in the next few years. So that is how they have to look at it.

Instead of burning draft picks at the deadline, they should over pay a little to get some young economical guys on the roster who will be able to contribute in the near future. Roll the future assets into the present - but not with assets that are gone July 1. Get some more mileage out of younger players.

The other thing they can do, as I've mentioned before, is use some of MLSE money to beat the bushes all over the planet to try and find a couple of economical guys like Benoit & McMann to help make up for their lack of prospects/picks.

I do not think it is rocket science to figure this out. The circumstances are fairly clear. I'm sure Leafs management is way ahead of me on this. They know. It is not that hard. To me, aside from the burning of draft picks on rentals, I like their position for the next 2 seasons - particularly '25-26.

19 million for 2 top D, a solid backup, and fill out the forwards? I dunno. That leaves a potential giant hole in net.

Didn't put much thought into this but...

Montour 8 million
Pesce 5 million
Brossoit 3? million

Doesn't leave much for Domi, Betuzzi, or their replacements.

That is part of the reason why I like '25-26 better ...
Because they probably need 2 UFA summers and that cap space to fix it all.
Cowan and Minten should be more serviceable on the roster by that time.

Walker (4.7)/Tanev (4.7) instead of Montour/Pesce saves some dough for Domi
But if Domi wants $5-6 mil as LeBrun reported, I would pass.
Put Minten in instead and add maybe Haakanpaa (1.5) as the 6th RD

They need to take Bertuzzi's $5 mil and plough it into their D.

 

[Bill_Berg]

Having lived through the Sundin era, and so have pretty much all of you, the willingness to throw away such a talented player is baffling to me.

Just imagine if Sundin had just one of Nylander, Marner or Matthews on his teams.

I?m 100% with cw on this one, supporting cast and goaltending are what need to be addressed.

It?s absolutely pathetic that the leafs haven?t drafted and developed a star goalie since Potvin. And the one they did they punted in what I call the worst trade in franchise history.

Anyway a few mini rants there.

How do you pay for the Goalie and D needed when you have 4 guys making 8-figures up front? It's not Marner, it's the ridiculous unbalance of spending on this team. You wouldn't trade him for a top D man and more cap towards a decent goalie?

They have $19.4 mil in cap space this season
and between $40-50 mil next season.
They have more cap space/roster spot than many of the contenders.

Potentially. they can get 2 decent UFA dmen this summer with a decent backup.
Next summer there might be some decent UFA goalies available if they need them.

They have to look at things like that because it is too late to draft and develop much to help Matthews Cup runs in the next 4 years. They're past "ideal world roster development". The window for winning with Matthews et al is probably closing in the next few years. So that is how they have to look at it.

Instead of burning draft picks at the deadline, they should over pay a little to get some young economical guys on the roster who will be able to contribute in the near future. Roll the future assets into the present - but not with assets that are gone July 1. Get some more mileage out of younger players.

The other thing they can do, as I've mentioned before, is use some of MLSE money to beat the bushes all over the planet to try and find a couple of economical guys like Benoit & McMann to help make up for their lack of prospects/picks.

I do not think it is rocket science to figure this out. The circumstances are fairly clear. I'm sure Leafs management is way ahead of me on this. They know. It is not that hard. To me, aside from the burning of draft picks on rentals, I like their position for the next 2 seasons - particularly '25-26.

19 million for 2 top D, a solid backup, and fill out the forwards? I dunno. That leaves a potential giant hole in net.

Didn't put much thought into this but...

Montour 8 million
Pesce 5 million
Brossoit 3? million

Doesn't leave much for Domi, Betuzzi, or their replacements.

That is part of the reason why I like '25-26 better ...
Because they probably need 2 UFA summers and that cap space to fix it all.
Cowan and Minten should be more serviceable on the roster by that time.

Walker (4.7)/Tanev (4.7) instead of Montour/Pesce saves some dough for Domi
But if Domi wants $5-6 mil as LeBrun reported, I would pass.
Put Minten in instead and add maybe Haakanpaa (1.5) as the 6th RD

They need to take Bertuzzi's $5 mil and plough it into their D.

Yes, 25-26 is much better. Especially if they still have Marner at 11ish. Just hold out one more year. I'm not sure what the UFA class is for 2025, but maybe if they get just Montour this year, or at least 1 legit top pair guy, then they get the second top pair guy after JT is gone. That leaves room for a top six forward and goalie this year.

 

[cw]

That is part of the reason why I like '25-26 better ...
Because they probably need 2 UFA summers and that cap space to fix it all.
Cowan and Minten should be more serviceable on the roster by that time.

Walker (4.7)/Tanev (4.7) instead of Montour/Pesce saves some dough for Domi
But if Domi wants $5-6 mil as LeBrun reported, I would pass.
Put Minten in instead and add maybe Haakanpaa (1.5) as the 6th RD

They need to take Bertuzzi's $5 mil and plough it into their D.

Yes, 25-26 is much better. Especially if they still have Marner at 11ish. Just hold out one more year. I'm not sure what the UFA class is for 2025, but maybe if they get just Montour this year, or at least 1 legit top pair guy, then they get the second top pair guy after JT is gone. That leaves room for a top six forward and goalie this year.

There are some good names for '25-26 UFAs
https://www.capfriendly.com/browse/free-agents/2026?stats-season=2024
But it is so far out, many will be gone by Jul 1, 2025

Even the list for this summer - ~25 of the top 100 available will probably be signed between now and before July 1
Last summer, dmen got scooped up quickly.
There appear to be more this year but July 1 isn't here yet

 

[Bill_Berg]

And don't forget, they gotta save money for McDavid in 2026!

 

[Bullfrog]

But why only stats for games 5, 6, & 7. You don't get to those games except for winning in the first four. What about Marner's contributions in getting the team to the playoffs?

That's why I said it was cherry picking stats.

We should also make note that he's a completely different player in the regular season. Not all points are equal in terms of game-leverage.

Sorry, I was referring to the writer. I don't disagree. I'm all for valid criticism, it's just annoying when people use misleading stats as their evidence.

 

[Bullfrog]

The dispute isn't whether Marner is a bad player or not (he's very good), but it's a) the unbalanced allocation of finite resources, b) playstyle when it counts the most, and c) future value. On all three counts, there is a significant argument that retaining the premium talent of Mitch Marner at his demanded price will be detrimental to playoff success going forward.

This isn't the Leafs throwing away homegrown skill while the roster is bereft of skill. There is still a very strong core in Matthews, Nylander, Knies, Rielly (sort of), and Woll (injury concerns aside) that we would ideally like to add a centre and another defenseman to. The re-balancing should've been taken care of last offseason.

But why aren't we talking about trading Tavares instead?

Panarin's playstyle seems to be doing just fine in the playoffs. No way he's getting the heat Marner is.

My biggest complaint with Keefe -- whom I generally liked -- is that there was too much reacting to the other team and not enough playing to strengths, forcing the other team to react.

 

[cw]

19 million for 2 top D, a solid backup, and fill out the forwards? I dunno. That leaves a potential giant hole in net.

Didn't put much thought into this but...

Montour 8 million
Pesce 5 million
Brossoit 3? million

Doesn't leave much for Domi, Betuzzi, or their replacements.

That is part of the reason why I like '25-26 better ...
Because they probably need 2 UFA summers and that cap space to fix it all.
Cowan and Minten should be more serviceable on the roster by that time.

Walker (4.7)/Tanev (4.7) instead of Montour/Pesce saves some dough for Domi
But if Domi wants $5-6 mil as LeBrun reported, I would pass.
Put Minten in instead and add maybe Haakanpaa (1.5) as the 6th RD

They need to take Bertuzzi's $5 mil and plough it into their D.

Yes, 25-26 is much better. Especially if they still have Marner at 11ish. Just hold out one more year. I'm not sure what the UFA class is for 2025, but maybe if they get just Montour this year, or at least 1 legit top pair guy, then they get the second top pair guy after JT is gone. That leaves room for a top six forward and goalie this year.

For some clarity, I don't know the league as well as I used to.
Tanev may be too old. I liked Walker for his PK. But maybe there are better values or investments.
I'm leery of Montour because he seems to be at the top of the dmen bidding wars so they're less likely to get good value - it can get silly. (Maybe the Brantford boy gives them a hometown discount.) Partly being budget conscious to stretch a buck, for $10 mil you could get two pretty good RH Dman vs $8 mil for Montour alone. Pesce has turned down Carolina for 5 x $5 mil multiple times - he's determined to get north of that.

I'm not sure. The good news is they seem to have some decent options to fix that part of the roster problem.

 

[cw]

The dispute isn't whether Marner is a bad player or not (he's very good), but it's a) the unbalanced allocation of finite resources, b) playstyle when it counts the most, and c) future value. On all three counts, there is a significant argument that retaining the premium talent of Mitch Marner at his demanded price will be detrimental to playoff success going forward.

This isn't the Leafs throwing away homegrown skill while the roster is bereft of skill. There is still a very strong core in Matthews, Nylander, Knies, Rielly (sort of), and Woll (injury concerns aside) that we would ideally like to add a centre and another defenseman to. The re-balancing should've been taken care of last offseason.

But why aren't we talking about trading Tavares instead?

Panarin's playstyle seems to be doing just fine in the playoffs. No way he's getting the heat Marner is.

My biggest complaint with Keefe -- whom I generally liked -- is that there was too much reacting to the other team and not enough playing to strengths, forcing the other team to react.

With Nylander & Matthews hurt/hurting, Keefe put Tavares and Marner on Pastrnak's line to check him. They did a decent job. But with 2/3rd of their starts in the d-zone and Nylander-Matthews hurt, the core 4 were compromised in terms of scoring. I haven't seen that mentioned much in the crucify Marner articles.

That is on Keefe but he did get them to game 7 OT against a better team so it is hard to be too wildly critical. I'm sure he had his reasons.

 

[Frank E]

The dispute isn't whether Marner is a bad player or not (he's very good), but it's a) the unbalanced allocation of finite resources, b) playstyle when it counts the most, and c) future value. On all three counts, there is a significant argument that retaining the premium talent of Mitch Marner at his demanded price will be detrimental to playoff success going forward.

This isn't the Leafs throwing away homegrown skill while the roster is bereft of skill. There is still a very strong core in Matthews, Nylander, Knies, Rielly (sort of), and Woll (injury concerns aside) that we would ideally like to add a centre and another defenseman to. The re-balancing should've been taken care of last offseason.

But why aren't we talking about trading Tavares instead?

Panarin's playstyle seems to be doing just fine in the playoffs. No way he's getting the heat Marner is.

My biggest complaint with Keefe -- whom I generally liked -- is that there was too much reacting to the other team and not enough playing to strengths, forcing the other team to react.

With Nylander & Matthews hurt/hurting, Keefe put Tavares and Marner on Pastrnak's line to check him. They did a decent job. But with 2/3rd of their starts in the d-zone and Nylander-Matthews hurt, the core 4 were compromised in terms of scoring. I haven't seen that mentioned much in the crucify Marner articles.

That is on Keefe but he did get them to game 7 OT against a better team so it is hard to be too wildly critical. I'm sure he had his reasons.

Thank you for the interesting conversation, gentlemen.

I think it just comes down to, for the Leafs, the obvious issue of too many eggs in one basket when it comes to the more physical end of season/playoff hockey.  Those successful in this tournament have a combination of depth and luckiness/unluckiness of attrition at this time of year.

 

[herman]

The dispute isn't whether Marner is a bad player or not (he's very good), but it's a) the unbalanced allocation of finite resources, b) playstyle when it counts the most, and c) future value. On all three counts, there is a significant argument that retaining the premium talent of Mitch Marner at his demanded price will be detrimental to playoff success going forward.

This isn't the Leafs throwing away homegrown skill while the roster is bereft of skill. There is still a very strong core in Matthews, Nylander, Knies, Rielly (sort of), and Woll (injury concerns aside) that we would ideally like to add a centre and another defenseman to. The re-balancing should've been taken care of last offseason.

But why aren't we talking about trading Tavares instead?

Panarin's playstyle seems to be doing just fine in the playoffs. No way he's getting the heat Marner is.

My biggest complaint with Keefe -- whom I generally liked -- is that there was too much reacting to the other team and not enough playing to strengths, forcing the other team to react.

Because there is no point in trading Tavares when he could still re-sign at a better value cap hit. Marner ain?t coming down from what is an astronomical ask (Nylander+, which is already too much for Nylander). Tavares still provides some value as a centre and mentor, after taking less to sign here as a UFA. There is little to no trade value either given we?d have to add assets/retain even if he?d waive.

I think Rangers fans might have something to say about Panarin?s showing.
https://www.reddit.com/r/rangers/comments/1d4lm2f/playoff_panarin/
And Panarin has more of a shot than Marner. I want to do a deep dive into the rosters of the semi finalists to see how many pure playmakers actually drive their teams to success in playoff hockey, because I kind of think it?s going to be not really.

That Keefe criticism is very valid. Too safe, too respectful.