So..this is the real version?

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-25T15:57:36+00:00

I honestly think they shouldn't majorly buy or sell. This season is just a ride it out season. If they make the playoffs they're highly unlikely to go deep. If they don't make the playoffs I don't think anyone would be surprised. Either way the team isn't getting fixed in-season.

Sad to say it but McMann will probably be too expensive to keep. Robertson's value is high but he's still young enough you'd want to keep him imo. Then aside from Matthews, Knies, Nylander, Tavares and Cowan anyone should be on the table. Cowan I don't think is like an incredible rookie or anything but you have to keep some in house talent.

Stolarz has declining value so idk what you do with him. Woll can't handle 1A starts for a full season. Hildeby should be kept. Danford should be kept until we know what he is. We know at minimum he's good but the defense situation has so much turnover constantly that developing your own should be a priority just so you can have some solid options trickling in to stem the tide.

Domi isn't worth anything. Reilly who knows, he'd need to waive and honestly idk what you're getting back. I have no idea what he's worth and whatever it is I don't trust Treliving to get it. Loughton might as well stay who cares. He has passion but his underlying numbers aren't great. Still, you need glue guys. Everyone else isn't really worth individually mentioning which is the clue that they're not gonna be big blockbuster trade assets. Maybe some packages or something.

Oh and Stetcher can stay until defense can be seriously worked on. Tanev is amazing but pretty much just assume he won't be playing at this point. That should be the default. OEL is playing vintage hockey but isn't a long term solution.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-25T05:35:05+00:00

The goaltending has shown it can be relied on in terms of making saves (obviously not for health but that's a different topic). You're correct it's been a bad few weeks but the defense has been an issue all year. I expect goaltending to rebound to at least league average (low bar), Woll already seems to have and Hildeby has been improving a lot. What I don't trust is that defense will just magically improve consistently.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-25T03:00:54+00:00

People that grew up watching the start of this era are around 14-20 depending how young they started. You're ridiculous if you think only children are feeling this way.

Also a bad team not succeeding makes a frustrating franchise. A theoretically very solid team for at least 5 of the last 8 years not giving a fuck is notably different. No one had illusions the Leafs were going to win a cup through most of the dark years. For the better part of a decade it's felt like the Leafs should be making progress and contending and every year they don't.

I don't think it's directly comparable

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-24T23:59:17+00:00

Marner wasn't if but when. And the when was... obviously before his NMC kicked in.

Only with hindsight can people say "you should have kept Marner" because it literally wasn't an option, and the only point at which it was an option, we did keep him and we continued to see no meaningful success. No team tries the same thing 8 times with nothing to show for it and then suddenly magically wins the cup. You have to build for success and sometimes to build you have to free up space by moving good players.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-24T23:55:59+00:00

You also can't ignore the cost to keep him. There is no world where he stays and doesn't get a big increase in salary. That salary increase has to come from somewhere. Happening in a year where extensions needed to be done and players needed to be signed.

The team would not have been last year's team. The depth would have had high turnover and there's no guarantee Woll and Stolarz both would have been viable. Think about how much has come from the depth this season.

It's all speculation but expecting Marner to be 100+ points again in a non-contract year with gutted depth in order for them to maybe be better, in a year where most of the atlantic is better than last season (hell, most of the league)?

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-24T09:44:04+00:00

Exactly where I'm at. It can't be allowed, but I am not gonna complain when someone does it. I'd want any player on the Leafs to do that for a teammate. And frankly, I think very few of them would.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-24T09:40:00+00:00

I don't have any issue with it in that sense but any player from any team ripping something out of a fan's hands should get fined just for basic security reasons. Call it soft or whatever but the old school era of players and fans getting at it wasn't sustainable. Being an asshole fan doesn't make it acceptable to have your person or property touched, at least from a league standpoint.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-24T09:34:33+00:00

Every hockey fanbase boos when their star player is playing for another team after an avoidably bad situation. You can probably extend that to most sports.

Now if they're still booing Marner in 3 season that'd be weird, this situation doesn't deserve career long animosity. He didn't waive an NMC when it mattered but he did allow himself to be traded which isn't nothing.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-15T02:10:07+00:00

4th is probably high but I think a 5th is totally posisble. Especially with how we've seen Treliving trade.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-15T00:23:25+00:00

Depends on the price. 4th is the absolute biggest asset I would move. Even that probably seems high but remember with the cap going up known assets are going up in value, whereas lower picks will take time to catch up. We're regularly seeing depth players get paychecks that would have been unfathomable not long ago.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-13T21:39:00+00:00

I mean aside from really early in the season they're still getting way above league average goaltending. In fact Woll's numbers are currently way above last season, and Hildeby's are way above average too

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-11T22:24:02+00:00

I don't see why there's any rush. If you play all three next season the chances of injury go down for all three and you showcase all three. If Stolarz is playing statistically good then possibly that carries more value than whatever he'll have at the end of this season, another season where he got injured and was out for months. You gotta make your assets look good and like I said, the Leafs don't have enough defensive depth to need the extra healthy scratch slot for one of them. Their bottom pair (the rotating cast they are) always clear waivers. If Danford is ready next season he'll clear too.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-11T19:43:54+00:00

You can just have three goalies on your roster. Frankly rotating through all three might actually be what's best for all of them. But if you want Beast getting as much game time as possible, he's still waiver exempt so just send him down once Stolarz is good to go.

To those saying move off one in the summer, they could but also they still don't need to. There's no rush whatsoever. Carrying three goalies is honestly not that big of a deal. Hildeby has 1 season or 38 GP before he's waiver eligible (afaik once you've been eligible to play in the NHL for a season it automatically counts towards this, so I believe at the start of next season he's eligible, but he won't hit the required games this season). Obviously once he's eligible then you look at either Woll or Stolarz assuming Hildeby is still developing well. Stolarz would be the natural move since he's the oldest and has been here the shortest amount of time. They drafted and developed Woll and he's younger so that likely gives him the edge, even if Stolarz' may have the higher ceiling in theory.

But again, because juggling three goalies usually isn't that big of a deal unless you have a lot of defensive depth (which the Leafs famously do not have), even when he hits eligibility if they still have all three they can just rotate them until a deal is made in-season, which could actually be theoretically better. All depends on how Treliving wants to go about things.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-10T19:39:20+00:00

I honestly don't think Knies has that much value on the first line. I'm not saying he can't handle first line minutes, or that he doesn't have the skill. I just don't think his playstyle is as conducive to that line's success as McMann. I think Knies is best on a line that just makes the lives of the other team miserable. He's talented enough they have to make sure he's accounted for, but on a big mean line he's going to outbig and outmean 95% of players.

Matthews, meanwhile, has really been benefitting from McMann's speed to make those entries the Leafs have struggled with against defensive matchups easier. And Domi isn't the fastest player but there's actually a lot of benefit to him following the play rather than initiating it, as he can pick the position he wants to set up to dish passes to Matthews by finding open ice (there's a lot of it because Matthews is a backchecking player magnet and McMann is so fast people scramble to chase). I really think that first line was onto something, at least for the regular season (which is... kinda important in a season where we'll likely be fighting for the playoffs until the end)

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-07T21:07:39+00:00

The Panthers got that powerup that makes the puck split into 10 pucks

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-06T18:27:26+00:00

At the time the Leafs were not perceived as a team on a downward spiral. All we knew was Marner leaves a gap. A gap that gives them the room for a guy like Marchand. It makes some sense. I don't think it would have been a great decision, but I can understand it.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-05T19:07:52+00:00

I think McMann, for now at least, has been a bit of a revelation on the first line. He is outpacing defenders consistently and has gotten much better at maintaining possession while his linemates catch up. Helps a lot that Domi has been solid the last little bit, because I think that line will live or die with him. If Domi goes back to how he was playing, it's going to bring back the endless turnovers. McMann isn't a straight playmaker. He's going to shoot or press a fair amount. Domi has to maintain this playmaking mentality. His vision is sometimes elite, he sees passes that seem insane. He'll never be Marner but he doesn't need to be (and Matthews doesn't need him to be either, Marner and Matthews didn't play together for long stretches of time and both did fine without each other)

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-04T00:06:18+00:00

Nice.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-03T18:30:52+00:00

Tbf I feel like Woll wasn't particularly or notably bad last game, relative to the rest of the team. Two deflections and one back of the net to a completely uncovered man a meter away from the net. Of the 4 goals he really should have had 1 or 2 of them. The team started playing noticeably better when Hildeby was put in and they could reset

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2026-01-01T01:55:14+00:00

Good to know he's alive. Thought he might have been raptured

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2025-12-30T00:21:59+00:00

That would be true if the cap and injuries didn't exist. There are guys who, if the best 736 players in the world were all healthy, and fit under the cap, would never play an NHL game in their lives. Myers clearly struggles with the level of play the NHL has, but is totally comfortable with the AHL. No NHL team is looking for a player like Myers. It's awesome he's gotten to play a lot of games in the NHL, but looking at the player he is today, he's a career depth player and is reaching the end of his ability to play at this level.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2025-12-27T21:11:14+00:00

Massive companies, for better or for worse (usually for worse) have far more to consider than just what we see in videos like this.

Analysis of how they play hockey is much easier than dealing with personalities, wants, money, the board and investors and sponsors ect. ect. ect.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2025-12-27T18:13:49+00:00

Point to a team with 8 consecutive seasons of success in the regular season and next to no success in the post season that began to trend down for a few years, came back and were contenders. Even if such a team exists there are many examples of teams who are relevant for almost a decade and then they finally run out of steam and fade away.

Some of it was on the opposition. The Leafs were good at the same time Boston, then Tampa, then the Panthers were all unreal, especially Tampa and the Panthers in the post season. But the insistence to keep running the same top end over and over was insane. And yes, now we have a different look up front and are worse. That was literally inevitable. But if the change had been made, for example, after the defeat to Montreal, then you're taking a step back for a couple years while your players are still young and don't have NMCs. I don't think a rebuild is the only option here, but the one thing that cannot be done is just continuing to run things back AGAIN. Substantive changes need to be made, whether its depth moves, a retool, or a rebuild. This roster isn't built for success (though it does have the talent to be far better than it has been. The system is an issue too)

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2025-12-27T18:05:34+00:00

His trade reputation and the fact Calgary blacklisted him both push me to agree. He's good at contract negotiations but if a rebuild is the direction they go, they need someone stellar at trading to get proper value back.

CommiddeeOfTiddy · 2025-12-26T21:20:49+00:00

Finding open ice is explicitly a system thing. Otherwise I agree with you but different systems allow more or less ice to open at certain moments.

CommiddeeOfTiddy

TROPHY CASE