Leafs @ Flyers - Dec. 12th, 7:00pm - TSN4, Fan 590

[L K]

Last minute of play down a goal....and Nylander is on the bench.  Babcock needs to get his head out of his rear end

I agree 100%.  That's just insulting to Nylander.  Absolutely ridiculous and somebody in the media needs to call him out on it.

So who else thinks that Nylander is probably going back to the 4th line because he lost the puck there on the empty netter?

Pretty much me.  I think Babcock is doing some kind of stupid "you learn by punishment" routine with him.  I think it's a load of crap to be honest.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

I understand Babcock wants to teach them to be able to play this way, but he's asking thoroughbreds to plough the fields.

He's asking snowmobiles to heat the house.

 

[azzurri63]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

 

[L K]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

 

[Kin]

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

To be fair Couturier is only 6'3 and 215lbs. Guys like that just float away.

 

[WhatIfGodWasALeaf]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Exactly, I don't think he realizes that the version of the game he's thinking about doesn't exist anymore.

Polak consistently gets penalized because he wants to play the old school gritty version of the game which involves being violent with your stick, cross-checking, boarding and slashing were all the norm and now the refs call those almost everytime.

The game has moved on, it's largely about speed, body position and ability to stick check.

I wouldn't mind the Leafs forwards leaving more of the body on opposition dmen when they have less than a 50% chance in a puck battle, but again I realize part of why they don't is because they are being told to constantly get in position to press the puck.

It's the same as the Geggenpress principle in soccer, you press as an entire team and don't overcommit unless you know the odds are in your favour.

 

[azzurri63]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Try moving him something you're telling me you can't move a guy off a puck. At least if one of him is trying that the other guy might be able to steal it. Watching 3 of them fishing for it worked real well there. Have you ever played the game? I've seen guys knocked off the puck in beer league for gods sake. Team has too many offensive, gifted players. Fine and dandy but you need a bit of nastiness to go along with it. Polak, Martin and Kadri at time may show that but none of them strike fear in anyone. Rest of the team forget it.How many times you see some of them get rid of the puck when they see an opposing player coming at them. Give up possession cuz your scared to take a hit.

 

[L K]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Exactly, I don't think he realizes that the version of the game he's thinking about doesn't exist anymore.

Polak consistently gets penalized because he wants to play the old school gritty version of the game which involves being violent with your stick, cross-checking, boarding and slashing were all the norm and now the refs call those almost everytime.

The game has moved on, it's largely about speed, body position and ability to stick check.

I wouldn't mind the Leafs forwards leaving more of the body on opposition dmen when they have less than a 50% chance in a puck battle, but again I realize part of why they don't is because they are being told to constantly get in position to press the puck.

It's the same as the Geggenpress principle in soccer, you press as an entire team and don't overcommit unless you know the odds are in your favour.

Noone is going to disagree that Bozak is bad at winning puck battles along the boards either (I assume?).  But the reality is that the handful of guys who are marginally better at it (Hyman, maybe Komarov) aren't really guys you want out there in the final minute.  That Nylander wasn't out there until the final 30 seconds was bad bench management from Babcock.  That the team is playing a dump and chase game with a team that isn't that great at puck retrieval is just insanity for me.

 

[L K]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Try moving him something you're telling me you can't move a guy off a puck. At least if one of him is trying that the other guy might be able to steal it. Watching 3 of them fishing for it worked real well there. Have you ever played the game? I've seen guys knocked off the puck in beer league for gods sake. Team has too many offensive, gifted players. Fine and dandy but you need a bit of nastiness to go along with it. Polak, Martin and Kadri at time may show that but none of them strike fear in anyone. Rest of the team forget it.How many times you see some of them get rid of the puck when they see an opposing player coming at them. Give up possession cuz your scared to take a hit.

If you want to play the "have you ever played the game" nonsense, we are done.  Yes, I have played and continue to play. 

 

[azzurri63]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Exactly, I don't think he realizes that the version of the game he's thinking about doesn't exist anymore.

Polak consistently gets penalized because he wants to play the old school gritty version of the game which involves being violent with your stick, cross-checking, boarding and slashing were all the norm and now the refs call those almost everytime.

The game has moved on, it's largely about speed, body position and ability to stick check.

I wouldn't mind the Leafs forwards leaving more of the body on opposition dmen when they have less than a 50% chance in a puck battle, but again I realize part of why they don't is because they are being told to constantly get in position to press the puck.

It's the same as the Geggenpress principle in soccer, you press as an entire team and don't overcommit unless you know the odds are in your favour.

Quit telling me the version of this hockey doesn't exist anymore. Tired of some of you telling me that. They haven't gotten rid of hitting altogether. Although I'm sure some of you would love to see that. Someone commented earlier about Polak not doing his job clearing the front of the net on the second Flyer goal. I brought that up the other day and was told you can't do that anymore. BS. You can still get positioning on a guy and try and move him out. Sh*t if they can't do that they might as well play 3 on 3 and take the defenseman right out of the game which again I'm sure a lot of you would love to see that.

 

[Kin]

I've seen guys knocked off the puck in beer league for gods sake.

This just in, NHL players are harder to knock off the puck than beer leaguers.

 

[L K]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Exactly, I don't think he realizes that the version of the game he's thinking about doesn't exist anymore.

Polak consistently gets penalized because he wants to play the old school gritty version of the game which involves being violent with your stick, cross-checking, boarding and slashing were all the norm and now the refs call those almost everytime.

The game has moved on, it's largely about speed, body position and ability to stick check.

I wouldn't mind the Leafs forwards leaving more of the body on opposition dmen when they have less than a 50% chance in a puck battle, but again I realize part of why they don't is because they are being told to constantly get in position to press the puck.

It's the same as the Geggenpress principle in soccer, you press as an entire team and don't overcommit unless you know the odds are in your favour.

Quit telling me the version of this hockey doesn't exist anymore. Tired of some of you telling me that. They haven't gotten rid of hitting altogether. Although I'm sure some of you would love to see that. Someone commented earlier about Polak not doing his job clearing the front of the net on the second Flyer goal. I brought that up the other day and was told you can't do that anymore. BS. You can still get positioning on a guy and try and move him out. Sh*t if they can't do that they might as well play 3 on 3 and take the defenseman right out of the game which again I'm sure a lot of you would love to see that.

You aren't getting it.  People aren't telling Polak to clear the net like that.  They are saying you can't do that so boasting about Polak's ability to do something you can't do anymore (as evidenced by his penalty in the Edmonton game) isn't proving that he has a valuable attribute.  He has a skill that is useless in the NHL in 2017.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

Someone commented earlier about Polak not doing his job clearing the front of the net on the second Flyer goal. I brought that up the other day and was told you can't do that anymore. BS. You can still get positioning on a guy and try and move him out.

Bringing up a play where a goal was scored while a player was attempting to clear the front of the net is a strange way to say players should still clear the front of the net.

 

[azzurri63]

Team has no grit don't care how many of you on here disagree with me but till they get some teams not going anywhere. Can't have 90% of a team that only think offence, won't take the body, willing to sacrifice taking a hit to get the puck. utterly disgraceful. U have your goalie out and watch 3 of them trying to fish the puck out of Couturier's skate wasting 30 seconds. Bozak, Marner and whoever the 3rd tit was. Knock the guy off the puck. Pathetic to say the least. But the way they sit back and let teams come at them bound to bite them in the ass on some nights .Almost doubled up on shots again. Great job Mike. Idiot.

Your understanding of how easy it is to "knock the guy off the puck" in the middle of a scrum is astounding.

Exactly, I don't think he realizes that the version of the game he's thinking about doesn't exist anymore.

Polak consistently gets penalized because he wants to play the old school gritty version of the game which involves being violent with your stick, cross-checking, boarding and slashing were all the norm and now the refs call those almost everytime.

The game has moved on, it's largely about speed, body position and ability to stick check.

I wouldn't mind the Leafs forwards leaving more of the body on opposition dmen when they have less than a 50% chance in a puck battle, but again I realize part of why they don't is because they are being told to constantly get in position to press the puck.

It's the same as the Geggenpress principle in soccer, you press as an entire team and don't overcommit unless you know the odds are in your favour.

I agree to some of your points. Polak yes the guy plays hard but he also plays stupid. I'm not saying you have to board, cross check etc for sure you're just asking for trouble. Clearing the front of the net they all have to do a better job of that. problem is we don't have any big physical defenseman that can do it.

 

[L K]

I've seen guys knocked off the puck in beer league for gods sake.

This just in, NHL players are harder to knock off the puck than beer leaguers.

I would like to point out that in my last game I was on the ice for 7 minutes straight because our team was decimated by people having to work.  Clearly Babcock should be employing this strategy in the NHL because if I can play 7 minutes straight in my beer league everyone should be doing it at the NHL level.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

I would like to point out that in my last game I was on the ice for 7 minutes straight because our team was decimated by people having to work.  Clearly Babcock should be employing this strategy in the NHL because if I can play 7 minutes straight in my beer league everyone should be doing it at the NHL level.

Shhhhhhhhhhh he might legit do this with Hainsey shhhhhhh

 

[azzurri63]

I've seen guys knocked off the puck in beer league for gods sake.

This just in, NHL players are harder to knock off the puck than beer leaguers.

So why is it any different? Don't matter what league you're in. It's men against men. No different than bantams knocking down bantams or junior players on junior players.

 

[L K]

I've seen guys knocked off the puck in beer league for gods sake.

This just in, NHL players are harder to knock off the puck than beer leaguers.

So why is it any different? Don't matter what league you're in. It's men against men. No different than bantams knocking down bantams or junior players on junior players.

And this is where we have the discussion of core strength, balance and what you are legally allowed to do to leverage yourself over an opponent.  The reason you can easily knock guys off the puck along the boards in a beer league is because half of everyone on the ice had 5 beers before they played and half the time they fall down skating in open ice.  They don't have good core strength or the ability to balance themselves on the ice.

Junior players are better at it but haven't established that skill. 

NHL players on the other hand actually know how to stay on their skates.

 

[Kin]

So why is it any different? Don't matter what league you're in. It's men against men. No different than bantams knocking down bantams or junior players on junior players.

Because when god invented the universe he decided to make it work by way of the laws of physics? Not sure what to tell you here.

 

[Strangelove]

So the contrast between this team and the team we watched for the first 10 games of the year is pretty startling. They have a really hard time generating speed and any kind of flow, seemingly because they are always focused on their latest assignment/match up.

Babcock has to realize that he is over-coaching, step back, and let them focus on sustaining speed and offence, which should be their bread and butter.

He also has to stop being so egalitarian with ice time and let his best players play.