[GDT] EC Play-In Round: Toronto Maple Leafs (8) vs Columbus Blue Jackets (9) Tied 2-2

[dissentowner]

Originally Posted by Geeoff

These play-in series went almost perfectly LOL

Next Up: Minnesota or Nashville to win the draft lottery

That would not be perfect. Florida or the Rangers would be much better. Especially Florida.

[direwolf]

Haha, stupid Leafs!

[Voodooman]

As long as it's not the filthy Oilers or the idiot Leafs, I'll be satisfied.

I think the dream outcome is Pittsburgh. Expose the first lottery for the poorly executed plan it was. Sure, they get more loaded, but it's the East, and will only make life more difficult for the Leafs and Habs, so I'm good with that.

Florida is the nightmare, both for the player and the league. Just a waste of a massive opportunity in a garbage market. If you thought McAvi looked crushed when the Oilers got the #1, imagine the look on Alexis' face when it's good old F-L-A. Of course, I've heard some rumblings about the pools down there...

As to the series itself, I predicted weeks ago that Torts would coach rings around Sheldon with the amount of prep time he had. That series was the epitome of system over talent, with a heaping helping of white hot goaltending. I would have paid real money to hear what Torts had to say after Game 4 though. That would have been some paint blistering language.

[troutman]

So glad CBJ won, or we would be hearing about the "comeback" every day for all eternity.

[Flamenspiel]

Hopefully an eastern team wins the lottery, I don’t really care which. If that does not happen then any of the central teams would be ok.

I don’t care about the Leafs, they are irrelevent.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by savemedrzaius

Barrie was a HUGE disappointment.

This was not a surprise - he was never what the Leafs needed. They needed a defenseman, not an offensive defenseman who can't play defense.

[Steve Bozek]

Originally Posted by bubbsy

Leafs went the early oilers rebuild route, with a heavy bias to skilled, soft forwards. No focus on size, grit, or any semblance of defence.

....

I predict the leafs will look to move nylander to bring in an actual top 4 d.

Traikos article in today’s Herald suggests Nylander could get them as much as a Seth Jones - a beautiful example of how the Toronto media hype and overvalue the Leaf players. The sad thing is that some GMs are stupid enough to believe them (e.g. Risebrough, Sutter).

[LChoy]

I think having such a stacked forward group actually hurts the Leafs
Their greatest issue all series was scoring 5 on 5. Maybe in the regular season and on the Powerplay they can bring up a high power offense, but they don't have a team that can play playoff hockey. Outside of special teams, playoff goals tend to be the dirty garage type goals, things like tips and breakdowns. The leafs spent too much time trying to make the pretty plays and don't have the players to get into the tough areas in front of the net
At least my opinion

LChoy

[savemedrzaius]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

This was not a surprise - he was never what the Leafs needed. They needed a defenseman, not an offensive defenseman who can't play defense.

He sucked offensively too.

[Vinny01]

Originally Posted by savemedrzaius

He sucked offensively too.

It is unfortunate for the Leafs that Kadri shut down the trade to Calgary. While Kerfoot is better than Janko that $3.5M cap hit for Kerfoot is not ideal. Brodie had a better season and significantly better play in round than Barrie.

Luckily for the Flames Bennett has transformed into a Kadri like player who can make an impact at center while providing some needed grit.

[mrdonkey]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

It is unfortunate for the Leafs that Kadri shut down the trade to Calgary. While Kerfoot is better than Janko that $3.5M cap hit for Kerfoot is not ideal. Brodie had a better season and significantly better play in round than Barrie.

Luckily for the Flames Bennett has transformed into a Kadri like player who can make an impact at center while providing some needed grit.

And luckily for the Leafs there's a pretty good chance Brodie signs there in a few months anyway.

[savemedrzaius]

Originally Posted by LChoy

I think having such a stacked forward group actually hurts the Leafs
Their greatest issue all series was scoring 5 on 5. Maybe in the regular season and on the Powerplay they can bring up a high power offense, but they don't have a team that can play playoff hockey. Outside of special teams, playoff goals tend to be the dirty garage type goals, things like tips and breakdowns. The leafs spent too much time trying to make the pretty plays and don't have the players to get into the tough areas in front of the net
At least my opinion

LChoy

Leafs were a pretty good 5on5 in the regular season and in the playoffs.

Leaf fans in general are quite annoyed with how they never get powerplays. They tend to get one or two a game and.most people think think this is because they don't commits lot of penalties so the refs want to keep it even.

Leaf games are almost always low penalty games.

[timbit]

Originally Posted by savemedrzaius

Leafs were a pretty good 5on5 in the regular season and in the playoffs.

Leaf fans in general are quite annoyed with how they never get powerplays. They tend to get one or two a game and.most people think think this is because they don't commits lot of penalties so the refs want to keep it even.

Leaf games are almost always low penalty games.

The Leafs excel in perimeter play.

Between the dots compete level and execution determine Winners and who gets PP opportunities.

The refs were fine.

The Leafs weren’t.

Will beat skill.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Let's not go nuts here. The leafs shot less than 2% for the series. They have some guys who have excellent shooting ability, regardless of where the shot is being taken from. They could play this series ten more times and that wouldn't happen again. To all these "will over skill", "won't get to the dirty areas" things, my retort is, "John Tavares".

The better theory is that the Leafs are simply cursed and will never win anything regardless of who is on the roster or what their strategy is.

[timbit]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Let's not go nuts here. The leafs shot less than 2% for the series. They have some guys who have excellent shooting ability, regardless of where the shot is being taken from. They could play this series ten more times and that wouldn't happen again. To all these "will over skill", "won't get to the dirty areas" things, my retort is, "John Tavares".

The better theory is that the Leafs are simply cursed and will never win anything regardless of who is on the roster or what their strategy is.

10 goals in 5 games.

Cursed?

Great rebuttal.

[Coach]

A curse is never a “better theory”. For real?

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by timbit

The Leafs excel in perimeter play.

Between the dots compete level and execution determine Winners and who gets PP opportunities.

The refs were fine.

The Leafs weren’t.

Will beat skill.

"Compete level" and "will" are pretty abstract things that probably have a lot less impact than people assume, and tend to mean pretty much nothing.

The two went into the playoffs evenly matched. Columbus is a better defensive team, Toronto is a better offensive team. Bounces probably went in the Blue Jacket's favour more, and they were able to shut down Toronto better than Toronto was able to overwhelm them. A lack of high-end offensive skill doesn't make Columbus an unskilled team or make Toronto more-skilled as a team.

It's a nice narrative, but hockey is just as much about luck as it is about skill. When two even-quality teams like Toronto and Columbus meet, they're likely to get near equal bounces, and it really comes down to how many end up in the net.

Look at Calgary/Winnipeg. If you watched the series, they were two fairly evenly matched teams. Bounces aplenty. It could easily have been a 3 game sweep for Calgary or even a series win for the Jets had the bounces gone slightly differently.

Basically, saying the Leafs are cursed is about as valid as saying Columbus won because of will power and compete level. It's the NHL, every team has will power and compete level. That's why those players are in the NHL.

[Enoch Root]

Yeah, it was a very even series, and a couple bounces going differently and it could have been a different outcome.

Somebody has to win.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

It is unfortunate for the Leafs that Kadri shut down the trade to Calgary. While Kerfoot is better than Janko that $3.5M cap hit for Kerfoot is not ideal. Brodie had a better season and significantly better play in round than Barrie.

Luckily for the Flames Bennett has transformed into a Kadri like player who can make an impact at center while providing some needed grit.

The jury's out on that one IMO. Kadri is a roughly 20 goal, 50 point guy on a pretty consistent basis, though they play a similarly penalty laden style. I'm afraid I can't base a "Bennett's turned the corner" judgment off of a 4 game series.

[Enoch Root]

How about a 24 game sample?