derblaueClaus

Merry Christmas LGW! I hope Santa brings us a No.1 pick at the end of the season.

Merry Christmas LGW! I hope Santa brings us a No.1 pick at the end of the season.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, LGW FAM!
CHRISTMAS HYPE!

While it isn't ideal to lose someone after two games off the waivers, but Comrie probably wasn't the solution to our long term goalie problem. But Yzerman better solves the problem this summer unless he wants to prolong the tank. Howard is declining and unlikely to get back to his former self and Bernier is too mediocre to build a cup winner around.

While it isn't ideal to lose someone after two games off the waivers, but Comrie probably wasn't the solution to our long term goalie problem. But Yzerman better solves the problem this summer unless he wants to prolong the tank. Howard is declining and unlikely to get back to his former self and Bernier is too mediocre to build a cup winner around.

Saarijarvi had no value, and wasn't a part of the future. Losing Comrie, likely wasn't either, but I would have preferred to keep him over one of Howard / Bernier, who definitely aren't a part of our future...

I just think a really good, game changing player will be available at number 4. I think there's more risk involved in taking a goaltender top 5, than there is taking a skater. If Yzerman does take Askarov with that 1st pick, I'll trust him. I'd just hope it doesn't come back to bite us, because goalies are still a bit of a crap shoot, even the elite of elite at the age of 17...

For anyone not already in the discord, here is the invite: https://discord.gg/hQJDfW
I recommend joining ASAP, as discord invites expire after about a day or two. All you have to do is enter your email and you'll be in. It's basically just a chatroom, but like Dabs said, it's a place we can all go to say WTF when LGW is down.
EDIT: if you're reading this in the future, PM me and I'll send you a new discord invite.

Guys, i'm not sure how much more clear we can be on this. No politics on this board, ever. No American, Canadian, or International politics. This is the final warning on this, I will start handing out moderations in the future for any more violations. I'm confident the people who are discussing politics on here, that have been around here for a while, are very aware that it's against the rules here. Stop doing it, stop posting about it, keep it related to the NHL and hockey. 
Politics have no place on LGW, anywhere on this forum. There's thousands of other places on the internet to discuss politics on. 

Another major issue is how much that that line changes from person to person

I don't think there will be much of a change in the near future, aside from DeKeyser hopefully getting healthy soon. Next season, all of Green, Daley, Ericsson, McIlrath, Biega will likely be out, and Seider will be in. That alone should (in theory) be a pretty significant upgrade.
I could see something like this next season...
DeKeyser - Hronek
Nemeth - Seider
Cholowski - Bowey
That's not a terrible defense (on paper), and I could still see Yzerman acquiring a defenseman via trade before next season as well, or perhaps another stop-gap UFA...
I know some think next season will be just as bad or worse than this season, but I do believe this is rock bottom. I'm not saying we'll be a playoff team as early as next season, but I do think we'll be much improved...

For a good amount of time there this fanbase in general, not pointing any fingers at you, swung their dicks around like Mike was the next coming of Scotty. Was that totally premature and wrong? Absolutely. Any overratedness he had going to the Leafs probably started with Detroit fans.
Then as soon as the roster started aging out, with no elite talent coming back in, Wings fans, like most sports fans do, started turning on the coach. Specifically calling him overrated. And personally, I'm like, yeah... ya dinguses... WE OVERATED HIM lol.

So then he spurns the Wings for a rival, and the rest is history. The man goes from best in show to "Babs sucks" in less than 5 years time. I just think that screams butthurtness on our fandoms behallf more than it does any true evaluation of him as a coach. And in reality, I think he's probably somewhere in the middle, not amazing, not suck, just an above average coach who does a few things particularly well.
That's why I ask where you rank him. Overrated doesn't necessarily mean bad or good, just lesser than. I would agree he's probably not gold standard Babs, but somewhere around top10 or 33rd percentile, I would say yeah.
In regards to his style, I could rant for a while about how I think "the new NHL style" is a trap. But instead of writing a book I'll just agree to disagree there. I think shutdown coaches will always be a commodity with value.
At the time, did you not think the switch from Detroit was Toronto was smart for him? I would absolutely agree with his critics that he's always had stacked teams. He's maneuvered his NHL career in that fashion. Breaks into the league with Anaheim, then immediately jumps ship and leverages that success to a position with a powerhouse Detroit team. As soon as that starts going south he leverages his success there for a bidding war that takes him to a quickly up n coming Toronto. The fact that he got fired doesn't mean I don't think he was in a bad spot.
Ah I was gonna use this expression, but you beat me to it! I'm absolutely advocating jamming square pegs into round holes in this instance. This is also why I agree with you that Babs didn't fit the style there.
If the Leafs were a team full of John Tavares generation players, I would be right with you. Babs is a mistake, bring in a Laviollette or something. But I see a team of mostly sub 25 year old players with more than a few key pieces still being 22/23. There's a lot of growing to do there yet, and I think Babs would have been the ideal coach to mold Matthews, Marner, Kapanen, Nylander from young talented hot shots, into complete mature dominant 2-way players. In fact I thought that was Shanahan's plan all along, and I kinda feel like Shanny caved to Dubas and his players here. Of course I would expect growing pains, but I think that's a recipe for long term growth and success. Even if you fire Babs in 2 to 3 years when the transformation is complete and then go with a new coach.
IDK he's done some pretty big stuff in a short time. Signed arguably the biggest UFA of this decade. Tangled with some insanely high dollar hold out RFAs. Moved mountains to get his team cap compliant. Made some pretty big balls trades for guys like Muzzin. Already has one of his draft picks on the team in Rasmus Sandin. Brought in solid KHL contributors like Mikheyev.
Dubas has been no slouch so far.
I have no problem with analytics. But I don't think it's the end all be all. I do think Tavares was a mistake for them. Not because he's not a good player worth the money, but because of the wheels that set in motion. There's a reason Larkin is on lists for best contracts in the NHL, and Matthews, Marner, and Nylander are not. I think that team would have been very wise to avoid Tavares, keep overly rapid growth in check, and build that team out in a slower more nuanced way. But I guess that's probably easier said than done in a high pressure market like toronto.

I'm thinking a back up, like a discord, a subreddit, an email chain, an alternative site, or something else?
Just a place to go when things are down.
We should have a vote thread with all suggestions

Babcock absolutely should have been fired. He's a dinosaur. He refuses to evolve with the game, and unless he gets a big team, that plays "heavy" and "hard-on-pucks", I'm sure his next stop will end similar to this one. A good coach can adapt to the roster he is given. Babcock was given skilled players, and wanted them to play "grind-it-out" hockey. The Leafs have enough skill that they should be trying to win games 5-4, rather than 2-1. The problem was never that Matthews or Marner or whoever were too soft. It's that they weren't hard enough for Babcock. He'd prefer to rely heavily on the try-hards than the skill.
Dubas overpaid his star players, and Babcock overplayed the role players. That's why it didn't work out. The skilled players are the one's that are going to win hockey games, not the role players. Analytics are taking over the sport, and for good reason. We've seen the enforcers role diminish, and now we're starting to see the same with the grinders role. The league is getting faster and more skilled every year. Babcock's style of coaching will never last, unless he's willing to change... He won't.

Babs likes a heavy grinding style. This team is headed to a speed and skill build. A firm and definite nope.

Babs likes a heavy grinding style. This team is headed to a speed and skill build. A firm and definite nope.

Long time no see everyone, glad to be back!
I think this move will bite TO in the ass. Dubas did a bad job constructing this roster, and I see this is as him giving himself a second chance. Maybe Sheldon Keefe meshes better with these particular players, but I worry that TO is about to go down the road of the Oilers a few years ago, a team with great talent on paper, that just can't win. Not to mention, they are likely loosing their entire blueline in the summer. They couldnt have handled the Nylander/Mathews/Marner situation any worse. They should have traded Nylander for a young D-man, the a lesser deal with Marner first, then a larger deal with AM. But hindsight is 20/20.

Speedy recovery and all the best wishes.

Sorry for no liveblogging. Medical emergency in the family. I might be less present here indefinitely. Or maybe I'll be posting even more frequently to keep my mind off things.
Peace

So many ban-worthy things I could do with this.

Whats a blackout?

I never finished the 9th grade so Ha! Jokes on you.

Yeah, this is the blackout restrictions for us up North...

I have no idea why it's like it, but it's annoying as s***.
We pay for the service, we should have access to watch every single game...