As we awake this morning the Leafs sit dead last in the Atlantic Division.
Unfortunately, that’s a familiar place for them. It would seem that they’re picking up right where they left off last season.
What has lead to them being here? One could argue that the coaching hasn’t been up to par. Jim Hiller has come under fire early after the “oops, my bad” benching of last springs #1 pick, Gavin McKenna. Fair enough, although besides that slip up I can’t say that the new head coach has been all that bad.
Others may argue that Sergei Bobrovsky (0.891SV%) and Anthony Stolarz (0.875SV%) have allowed some goals that they’d like to have back. Stolarz admitted as much himself. Once again, that would be a fair point, especially when you look at Joseph Woll (0.916SV%) playing well for a Philadelphia Flyers team that took 10 games to garner their first win. Did Mats Sundin, who reportedly pushed hard to get Bobrovsky give up on Woll too soon? We’ll know soon enough, but that’s another story. I haven’t found Bobrovsky or Stolarz to be overly bad so far this year. Great? No. But not bad, either.
It isn’t special teams, that’s for sure. With the 8th best powerplay in the league and the best penalty killing record to date this season, the team is gelling in that area.
It isn’t star power up front. With Auston Matthews tied for 9th and William Nylander tied for 11th in the NHL’s scoring race, it’s clear that they’re doing everything they can to help the team win on that side of the ice.
The group’s depth scoring also appears to be enjoying a boost since last year. Easton Cowan is having a breakout year so far, with 7pts in 9 games, Gavin McKenna has 5pts, John Tavares had 7pts in 7 games until he was injured, etc. It’s really only the teams 4th line, that’s comprised of some mix of Teddy Blueger, Brandon Duhaime, Zach McEwen and Bo Groulx that are still looking to get on the scoresheet. Darren Raddysh and Morgan Rielly have 4 assists a piece, which isn’t exactly great or terrible, it’s “just okay.” What’s more important is the fact that the team is moving the puck more efficiently from the blueline as a whole.
The real reason that they’re losing games is because the team is, once again, terrible at suppressing shots on net and worse at keeping those chances to spaces where you would consider them safe. According to moneypuck.com the teams 13 high danger shots against is the 6th worst in the league, their 78 medium danger shots against is also 6th worst in the league and the team is dead last in terms of giving up goals on rebounds, with 26.92% of their goals against coming off of rebounds. In a nutshell, they’re allowing the other team to shoot from good areas of the ice and failing to protect the front of their net after they do so.
What they need is better defenders that are capable of steering the play to the outside and who can find loose pucks in front and clear them out of harms way. Players with the ability to tie up players and/or sticks in front, box out and force their opponents to the outside of home plate would allow the teams goalies the chance to make a save and then reset to make another, rather than scrambling to keep a rebound out.
Sorry, Nick Blankenburg, I’ve seen enough in a few short games to know that you aren’t the solution to that problem.
Neither is Kirill Marchenko.
So I have to ask, why did John Chayka trade Matthew Knies, who was obviously their biggest, most valuable trade chip, for anything but a top end defender?
You see, this has nothing to do with Kirill Marchenko the player. He’s a fine winger that has been producing well enough. The issue is that he’s still a winger and will never be able to play a position that the team is most in need of.
Since Auston Matthews was drafted the media and fans have been screaming out that the blueline isn’t good enough. What’s worse is that every management team that has taken over has complained that the blueline isn’t good enough as well. Kyle Dubas’ big swing in terms of fixing the issue was acquiring Jake Muzzin, but nobody ever considered Muzzin a #1 defender in this league. Maybe one of the best complementary defenders in the game at the time, sure, but not a guy that could dictate and/or change the game on a regular basis. Dubas also acquired Jake McCabe, who I’d argue is the Leafs’ best defender at the moment, at least in ways that don’t include filling out the scoresheet. That’s especially true if you are as concerned about the health of Chris Tanev as I am and aren’t really counting him as part of the blueline moving forward.
The Brad Treliving era is hardly worth talking about. A GM that was said to value defense and grit went way too far in the other direction. Whereas the biggest complaint during the Dubas years was that the team was too small and weak, the biggest complaint after Treliving left was that the blueline was too slow and clunky. The best move he made on the back end was acquiring and signing Chris Tanev. That was a great move at the time. Tanev is among the best defensive defenders in the game when healthy and he completely changed the outlook of the group. The real issue was turning to too many of the same players, such as Philippe Myers, Brandon Carlo and Simon Benoit to fill out the rest of the defensive unit. If he had managed to add some of those players, but not fill out the majority of the lineup with them, then maybe the results would have been more positive.
Enter John Chayka, who in the early going appears to be the anti-Treliving. He traded Joseph Woll and received the diminutive Emil Andrea in the return package. Yes, Andrea has been moved since then but that was only after the 5’9″ Nick Blankenburg appeared to be the better option in training camp. He retained Troy Stecher, who was a good soldier for the team last season after being picked up on waivers from the Edmonton Oilers, but is still your #6 or 7 defender, ideally. He also added Darren Raddysh, who had enjoyed a breakout season with the Tampa Bay Lightning last year at nearly 30 years old and, overall, has made the blueline far more mobile than it was this time last season. His attention to mobility is as focused as Treliving’s was to hulking, slow defenders.
However, a huge issue is that as soon as Chris Tanev went down to injury, it appears that this group simply can’t defend anymore and a lot of that has to do with the fact that players are being asked to play above their capabilities. Troy Stecher is playing in their top 4, Morgan Rielly is being leaned on once again and Darren Raddysh isn’t exactly lighting the league on fire like he did last season, which was fairly predictable. All of those players provide mobility to the group, but none can be viewed as shut down defenders, even if Stecher tries as hard as anybody.
No, the issue is still the fact that the team doesn’t have a defenseman that they can lean on during the tough times.
Zach Werenski was reportedly willing to waive his NMC to go to the Tampa Bay Lightning and/or the Toronto Maple Leafs. Even after all their back pedaling, it’s clear that Werenski wasn’t happy in Columbus.
John Chayka did what GMs do from there. He looked at the different packages that the Lightning could potentially offer the Jackets and realized that the Leafs had them backed into a corner. Werenski wanted out and even the Leafs’ “B” package would be better than what the Lightning could produce as their “A” offer. So that’s what he offered, his “B” pacakge. It’s not known what the package contained, but it was widely reported that the Leafs weren’t willing to trade Matthew Knies for Zach Werenski, as they viewed Knies as being simply too valuable to let go.
That was a mistake. Werenski would solve every issue that plagues the team right now. He would force the likes of Morgan Rielly and Troy Stecher into smaller roles, which would allow them to enjoy more success. He would be an ideal partner for Darren Raddysh, as he would still help with the mobility issues the team faced last season, but could also be a defensive rock for Raddysh to lean on. He’d be the go-to player that they’ve needed for a decade and he slipped through their fingers in an instant.
Chayka overplayed his hand, failed to land a true #1 NHL defender and to make matters worse, he ended up trading Matthews Knies anyway, but for a player that lines up in a position that they simply didn’t need. Just months after drafting left winger, Gavin McKenna, with the 1st overall selection at the NHL entry draft, signing Jack Roslovic and trading for Nick Paul, while still having William Nylander and Easton Cowan on board, this management group got together and decided that what they really need, above all else, is yet ANOTHER top 6 scoring winger?
Sometimes the biggest mistakes a GM can make is the trade he doesn’t pull the trigger on and not offering Matthew Knies for Zach Werenski, only to trade him for more of the same a few months later is that mistake. For me, even if the Werenski deal wouldn’t have gone through with Knies in the package, you still should have held on to your most valuable trade chip until the right piece became available. Maybe that would be Simon Edvinsson, who will likely be on the move out of Detroit soon enough and is quickly developing into a top pair defender. Maybe it’s a defender that has yet to be rumoured to be on the move. Regardless of who that player is, we all know who won’t fix the defense and that’s Kirill Marchenko.