July 15 ramblings

"The Leafs picked up Ryan Hollweg for a fifth rounder, precisely what they got for Wade Belak. I know Fletcher loves all the hitting that he runs around doing, but frankly I would rather have the toughest NHLer in the league sitting at the end of my bench. So yes, I would rather have Belak. I would also have rather signed Vrbata than Hagman, and promoted from within vs. Jeff Finger. I would have drafted Filatov over Schenn, too. Dobber for GM!" Dobber


I agree with Belak, Vrbata and anyone other than Finger BUT moving up in the draft to obtain Schenn was the best thing the leafs could have done. They have the offense in TO, what they have lacked for a long time is a defensive stay at home D and that is exactly what they got in the "Human Eraser".

They have offensive defensemen, but no offensive forwards. Unless you like Jason Blake. And as far as the pipeline goes, do you see any 70-point guys on the way? They need an offensive forward.

Defensive defensemen: Frogren (Sweden) and Kronwall. They need more of them, but to bring in Adam Foote Jr over a potential Jagr/Kovalchuk?

They are rebuilding. Lots of time to get defensive rearguards. They are available every summer, whenever the team is ready to take the next step. Offensive forwards are never available. If you don't believe me...look at who the Leafs sign each summer as their big offensive force. (Hagman, Blake...)
The real scorers are never available (Lecavalier, Thornton, Crosby, Ovechkin, Malkin, Zetterberg...)

Crazynuck wrote:
They have the offense in TO

Who ? Bell, Antropov, Ponikarovsky, Stajan, Steen, Tlusty, Mayers ? They will never reach 80 pts in one season.

What they don't have is a pure point (goals + assist) getter. In that case, Filatov would fit well. (Again, I'll say that Gamache would have a chance to do so).

Dobber for GM and Fergie for assistant-GM.

he leafs still finished 11th in GF in the league with a horrible team. they may not have the best offensive talent but they still score.
They may not have a 80pt scorer without Sundin but if they can keep the puck out of the net they could get enough wins to make the playoffs. I'm not saying this year but in the future of course.

Dobber, Fergie, do you want the Leafs to become the northern Thrashers? Atlanta followed that line of thinking and drafted the offensive superstars (heatley, kovy) before they had the team to support them. Worked out real well, hasn't it?

If you're gonna rebuild properly, you've got to do it in the correct order.

Franchise Goalie (6-8 years development).. Check (Rask, oops! Pogge)
Offensive Dman (6 years development)... Check (Stralman? Kaberle limits the need for this somewhat)
Defensive Dman (5-6 years development)... Check (Schenn)
Offensive Studs (3-4 years development)...08/09 and 09/10

If all goes according to plan, you have a very steady, balanced rebuilt team complete 5-6 years after you started. The other advantage to doing it this way is that you have your dmen and goalie coming to RFA status first, when you can get them signed to more reasonable money than stud forwards would be getting (ie. Weber vs Malkin), leaving money available later on for your forwards. ALSO, since building from the backend takes longer, you're "stuck" getting high draft picks for longer.

Bad Way: Atlanta
Stefan->Heatley->Kovalchuk->Lehtonen->Valabik
Notice how one of the forwards (and his replacement) is already gone and the other is on shaky ground before the dman even arrives and the goalie finds his footing!!

Good Way: Pittsburgh
Whitney->Fleury->Malkin->Crosby

Obviously, if you need to sell tickets fast, you need a Kovalchuk or Nash. But if you're in a stable market, you can afford to rebuild the right way.

I'm still voting for GM Dobber.

Crazynuck - you can't be serious about the offense thing... Sundin is gone. They aren't 11th anymore.

UW - you are right with that strategy, but they have defensive dmen and those commodities are easy to get. The offensive studs are impossible to get. Only one or two available per year. They need to be homegrown.
Even according to your little chart...the Leafs are already building in order and all I'm suggesting is flipping the defensive dman with the offensive stud at the end. That one little switcharoo makes them the Thrashers?

UW : you got to pick the best player available for your team. This changes per draft year. I think that the Thrashers did the right thing.

-Stefan was selected in a poor draft year (1999).
-They had to select Heatley in 2000 (either him or Gaborik).
-Kovalchuk...no doubt about it.
-Lehtonen, future goalie but injury came after the draft.
-Valabik, still in maturity stage.

It all comes up to the supporting cast that you will put in with your picks. The Thrashers drafted well.

Dobber wrote:
Crazynuck - you can't be serious about the offense thing... Sundin is gone. They aren't 11th anymore.


I never said they were 11th anymore. My point was that despite a horrible looking team they still finished 11th this past season. Aside from Sundin and Kaberle not many ppl picked leafs unless it was a deep pool. Then you could include Antropov, Blake and McCabe.

Lets take 19th ranked SJ Sharks.
Didn't score as much as the leafs but poolies stock piled on their top 6 .

Looking at the leafs outside of fantasy hockey they may not have the best players on paper but they seem to find a way to score year in and year out. There biggest problem is keeping the puck out of the net. Toskala is a start and combining him with Schenn and a few more pieces could be the answer. The Leafs have enough goals to make the playoffs if they can keep the puck out of the net IMHO.

fergie26 wrote:
UW : you got to pick the best player available for your team. This changes per draft year. I think that the Thrashers did the right thing.

-Stefan was selected in a poor draft year (1999).
-They had to select Heatley in 2000 (either him or Gaborik).
-Kovalchuk...no doubt about it.
-Lehtonen, future goalie but injury came after the draft.
-Valabik, still in maturity stage.

It all comes up to the supporting cast that you will put in with your picks. The Thrashers drafted well.
the Thrash made a couple no-brainer picks with Heatley and Kovalchuk... I think their current mediocrity speaks to how "well" they drafted.

I know, it would be awfully hard to pass up huge talents like Heater and Kovy, but all I'm saying is that they didn't build their team in the right way to support those guys. Either you subscribe to a plan like I layed out, or you go and draft those guys and then supplement the team around them through trades and free agents (example: Chicago getting Campbell/Huet to support Toews/Kane... although the Hawks also kind of followed the recipe by first drafting Barker and Seabrook).

The Buds missed on Filatov this year, but they can afford to take their time because they'll still sell out. Tavares next year, and Hall or Khabanov (sp?) the year after will go nicely with Schenn on the backend.

Dobber: Ok, I exaggerated. But I think using free agency or trades to get a player like Schenn is risky. Calgary did it by trading for Regehr, but it took a while. Philly did it by signing Hatcher all those years ago, and recently victimized Atlanta to get Coburn. But waiting for another GM to shoot himself in the foot has got to be a sketchy way of planning for the future, isn't it?

fergie: you've intrigued me enough that, if i have time tonight, i'm going to take a trip down "what could have been" lane and see if we can go back and craft a better Thrasher team with the draft picks they had. should be an interesting exercise, at least.

great thread, lots of good pts...let me add a few:

1)Saying that you need to have 70 pt guys to be an offensive threat is somewhat shortsighted. The Habs led the league in scoring last year with one 70+ scorer (Kovalev). There's nothing wrong with building 3 lines of guys that will all average between 40-60 pts and rolling thru them fairly equally (well it sucks for us fantasy guys but that's another story), it gives your team incredible depth and makes them difficult to defend. Guys like Antropov and Blake could be part of this kind of strategy for TO

2)UW you make some excellent points about needing to build a strong core so that your studs can be successful. I lived in Atlanta for years so I saw first hand how poorly managed that team is, its really sad because had they actually have drafted pretty well so had they had good management they'd be a contender right now. In their defense, they have the constant struggle to put butts in seats in ATL since its not a real hockey town so they can be somewhat forgiven for choosing flash before function. The Leafs however have no such excuses, they're the richest team in the league, they have an incredible fanbase, they've had good draft options, they've just fucked it up repeatedly and now they're in the mess that they are. They need to rebuild without question and I agree with UW that if they're smart they'll build a nice core first before they start adding the flash. You Leafs fans might not like that for a few years beause they'll be awful but its the smart approach