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GDT #43: Maple Leafs @ Devils 7pm EST

I’m a bad troll because I don’t troll.

Yeah you do, and you know you do, at least own it.

Just enjoy the awesomeness and stop with the doom and gloom of six years from now. Guy is going to crack 50 goals in his sleep. How fun is it to watch this?

It's very fun to watch, but we better win.

I think some of you people lack perspective sometimes. Winning is ****ing hard, and it's harder in a capped environment when you can't just spend your way out of mistakes, bad luck, etc. So signing JT because he's awesome now means you had better win now. Because if he stops being awesome (which there is a legit possibility of over the life of his contract) and you pay him awesome money, this means you're capped out and there's no more help coming.

This isn't doom and gloom, this is foresight. This is using the tools available to us to make the best guess as to whether or not a player is going to be worth what they're being paid over the long haul of the contract. Because as good as he's been, and he's been absolutely outstanding, has he been "2nd best player in the world" outstanding? No. Well, he's making "2nd highest paid player in the world" money. Value to cap cost is king in a capped environment. The only reason we can afford to pay the 20-30th best player in the world the 2nd highest amount of money is that we have better players who are cheaper, but that largely comes to an end at the end of this season. So yeah I don't go fanboy over the JT signing because until we've won something, the risk hasn't been rewarded yet. All I give a **** about is winning, not how fun it is to watch a 50 goal season. I've seen those before. All I give a **** about is winning.
 
I don't buy the "he's already slow so he can't possibly get slower" argument but calling him shatkins is funny. I agree that you have to make that move every time. It will suck in three or five years but whatever. Those are the aggressive moves that win you cups.

The marleau signing was dumb. The Zaitsev signing was dumb. But I don't mind acquiring talent. We know he'll be overpaid for arguably the majority of the contract, but you can live with it for as long as he's still a productive first liner, which he may be throughout the duration of the contract. But in the end they made the signing particularly for the first two or three years. They rightfully see a window there and they didn't have to give up any assets to acquire him. It's a bit of a no-brainer for me.

You just can't have any other bad contracts. They have a couple right now and those were Lou specialties. Next season will be tight but I think they're fine after that, especially as the cap continues to rise.

The ****ing lunatic has a more rational nuanced view of this than these other twits.

Bradley-Cooper-Wow.gif
 
Every player I listed is a HOF'er. They all declined through those years.



Would you pay a slightly better version of Kadri 11 million? If that's all he is for the last 3 years of the deal, then my concern will have been justified. Thank you, you've underlined exactly what my concern is.





Except Thornton is 6'5 235.



Hey, eat my ass. Syrup or jelly, your preference.

Happy to be wrong about what, that there's a significant amount of risk involved in the contract, but that he's an excellent player? Pardon me for not jerking myself silly over the move like some of you did. I'm obviously not as happy about it as some of you are. That you seem to want to toss aside the risk as meaningless shows me how horseshit the pollyanna view of this move is. The fact that you're not accepting how ****ing crippling paying 11 million to a guy who you're admitting could decline into a slightly improved version of Kadri, is telling.

The resistance to my view here is complete horseshit. I'm hardly advancing anything that is a controversial point, but because I'm saying it about JT a bunch of you ****s have sand in your box.

It is controversial.

Why would Tavares decline after 27 any more than Crosby, Ovechkin, or any other top player would? Because of an apparent lack of high end speed that he’s never had? Why are you so worried about a 33 year old Tavares?
 
It is controversial.

Why would Tavares decline after 27 any more than Crosby, Ovechkin, or any other top player would? Because of an apparent lack of high end speed that he’s never had? Why are you so worried about a 33 year old Tavares?

Eh let's not put JT in the Crosby tier. Take it down a notch. Players who lack speed often get a hell of a lot worse when they lose a step. It's the already quick ones that deal with losing a step much better. I never understood the "he's already slow so who cares if he turns into a turtle" mentality.

I agree that the signing was a no-brainer, but the risks and eventual downsides are obvious. No need to ignore them. It's still reasonable to like the signing even if you acknowledge that.
 
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He'll decline. It happens to the best of us. But he'll still be really ****ing good, and the deal is worth it all day. Best free agent signing the franchise has ever made by a mile.
 
He'll decline. It happens to the best of us. But he'll still be really ****ing good, and the deal is worth it all day. Best free agent signing the franchise has ever made by a mile.

Fair. If you don't have to give up assets to acquire a player as good as him you do that any time. I've always been of the belief that overpaying for talent is usually worth it.
You did acknowledge that he may turn into kadri by the end of the contract so that's nice. Just be prepared that it may happen in year three as opposed to year five, six or seven.

But like I said, aggressive moves like this are usually required to win cups. Like ME said though, even if they were the clear best team in the NHL for the next three years, their odds of winning even one cup aren't that good. Winning the cup requires a lot of luck and unfortunately the leafs division only lessens their odds.
 
That’s the thing, it’s unreasonable to think he’s going to degrade into a turtle. Not at 32 or 33.

Guy is a fitness freak and consummate pro. I don’t think he’s going to allow himself to just wilt in his early 30s.

So, the critique isn’t a realistic one.
 
I mean basically every player loses a step in their 30's. Sure, he's already slow but I don't think he can really afford to get that much slower. Eventually the skating becomes a liability.

I like the signing. IMO it was worth it. But let's not act like anyone was proven wrong because of year one of the contract. We all knew that year one would be a successful one. There's risk involved and it's silly to ignore that.
 
I think the point is that at 33, he should still be a first line quality player, making more than reasonable money half a decade of cap increases from now, he’ll have scored maybe 300 goals or more for us, and hopefully won a couple of Cups. It’s about as low risk and successful UFA signing as there could be. Will he be a little worse later? Sure, probably, but that doesn’t take away from all the good he’ll be bringing between now and his early 30s.
 
It is controversial.

Why would Tavares decline after 27 any more than Crosby, Ovechkin, or any other top player would?

Well, first is that Tavares doesn't belong in that class of player. He's simply not a Crosby or Ovechkin, those 2 belong in a legendary level of skill. We've only seen a dozen or so like them in the history of the league. Tavares is excellent, but he isn't that.

It's important to distinguish the difference there because of aging curves. The better and early a player's plateau, the long and more gradual the decline tends to be (just google "aging curve", there's a ton of work done in every sport on the planet for this). Barring injury, a player like Crosby is likely to age better than a player like Thornton, a player like Thornton is likely to age better than a player like Tavares, etc, etc, etc.

So why would he decline faster than Crosby or Ovechkin? Because he was never that level of player. Yet another reason why I'm so touchy about the word "elite".

When you classify Tavares properly though (as I did in my earlier post) and look at the expected decline of a player between their peak and 31-33 yrs old you see a pretty strong trend of decline, with the declines being in the range of 25-30% almost across the board from 3 average prior to their decline, so in JT's case if you were to take the last 2 years and then this year, that's 1.01 ppg. If he follows similar decline patterns to the names I mentioned earlier (Thornton, Sedin, Datsyuk, Richards, Lecavalier, etc) you're looking at him being a 55-60 point player by the end of the contract. Still a good centre, but more Kadri/Stastny than the names people like to group him with now. If he's like that for a year at the end of his deal, sucks, but not a huge deal. If he's closer to that than this for the entire back half of the contract though? That's ugly.

Because of an apparent lack of high end speed that he’s never had?

No, because losing a step is inevitable and this idea that a player who isn't fast can afford to lose additional foot speed is a dumb one. Speed is important to all players, full stop.
 
Oh yeah I take this 100 times before signing middling talents like JVR to long-term deals. That guy may not even be NHL caliber by the end of his deal. As long as he stays healthy I think we can hope for JT to be all-star caliber in his first three years, first line caliber in his next two, and low end first line/high end second liner in his last two years. I think that's the most realistic progression. Which to me would make him worth the contract.
 
Well, first is that Tavares doesn't belong in that class of player. He's simply not a Crosby or Ovechkin, those 2 belong in a legendary level of skill. We've only seen a dozen or so like them in the history of the league. Tavares is excellent, but he isn't that.

It's important to distinguish the difference there because of aging curves. The better and early a player's plateau, the long and more gradual the decline tends to be (just google "aging curve", there's a ton of work done in every sport on the planet for this). Barring injury, a player like Crosby is likely to age better than a player like Thornton, a player like Thornton is likely to age better than a player like Tavares, etc, etc, etc.

So why would he decline faster than Crosby or Ovechkin? Because he was never that level of player. Yet another reason why I'm so touchy about the word "elite".

When you classify Tavares properly though (as I did in my earlier post) and look at the expected decline of a player between their peak and 31-33 yrs old you see a pretty strong trend of decline, with the declines being in the range of 25-30% almost across the board from 3 average prior to their decline, so in JT's case if you were to take the last 2 years and then this year, that's 1.01 ppg. If he follows similar decline patterns to the names I mentioned earlier (Thornton, Sedin, Datsyuk, Richards, Lecavalier, etc) you're looking at him being a 55-60 point player by the end of the contract. Still a good centre, but more Kadri/Stastny than the names people like to group him with now. If he's like that for a year at the end of his deal, sucks, but not a huge deal. If he's closer to that than this for the entire back half of the contract though? That's ugly.



No, because losing a step is inevitable and this idea that a player who isn't fast can afford to lose additional foot speed is a dumb one. Speed is important to all players, full stop.

I can’t reply to all this on my phone, but suffice it to say, there’s pretty much zero basis to worry about the back half of his contract the way you are. Again, why such incredible concern for his 30 and 31 year old seasons? Why would he be markedly worse at those ages, especially while still playing with kids that haven’t even entered their primes yet by then?
 
I think Mindz is being a bit more pragmatic with Tavares because in a cap world you simply cannot afford a disaster contract like a 11M caphit could be in a few years. The nice part is that Tavares has such good players around him that he doesn't need to do it by himself anyway. He needs to be just good or better. Obviously Dubas feels he can find value elsewhere on the roster - and he'll have to if the Leafs are going to be competitive throughout JT's career with that cap hit and Marners and Matthews raises incoming.
 
That’s the thing, it’s unreasonable to think he’s going to degrade into a turtle. Not at 32 or 33.

Guy is a fitness freak and consummate pro. I don’t think he’s going to allow himself to just wilt in his early 30s.

So, the critique isn’t a realistic one.

Why do you think Tavares is going to decline better than the players I named did? As I mentioned earlier, Tavares' peak would put him near or at the bottom of that list. I mean, Brad Richards looks like the weak link here but:

At age 28 (with Richards missing a year of his prime to the lockout)

Richards: 548 points in 620 games: .88ppg
Tavares: 621 points in 669 games: .93ppg

They're closer than a lot of people would assume.

There's literally no good reasons for why JT would decline more gracefully than the players I named. Most of them were very healthy through out the majority of their careers, they were/are all excellent, HOF level players. The ones who weren't plus skaters were physically bigger.

This is absolutely realistic. The fantasy is that JT will decline more gracefully than players that were better than him at their peaks for...reasons.
 
I can’t reply to all this on my phone, but suffice it to say, there’s pretty much zero basis to worry about the back half of his contract the way you are.

This is just wrong, as I've pointed out.


Again, why such incredible concern for his 30 and 31 year old seasons? Why would he be markedly worse at those ages, especially while still playing with kids that haven’t even entered their primes yet by then?

Because players of that age decline, a message that I've tried to tell you for months, that you refuse to listen to. Even great players.
 
Oh yeah I take this 100 times before signing middling talents like JVR to long-term deals.

I'd prefer to just avoid that false dichotomy altogether. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. If I'm blowing my brains out in free agency, it's for a player of absolute need. Centre is always nice to have great depth at, but RHD is where our great need pretty clearly is.
 
Not trading Komarov and JVR and Bozak was a smart move. You have to sell your dressing room, on the fact, that you want to win.

Dubas did it.

This year? We have to keep Gardiner for the playoffs, simple as that. He literally could be the difference between the first round and the second round .
 
Fwiw, Dom L's model has Tavares as the 31st best player in the league in the 4th year of the deal:

https://theathletic.com/695092/2018/12/06/the-top-50-nhl-players-in-2021-22/

Obviously there is risk. But with a player like Tavares there is so little. Thats why these guys are worth the big contracts. Statistically he is more likely to still be a very good player in 7 years than for everything to go wrong. He is comparable to guys like Sundin, Turgeon, Thornton, Staal, Datsyuk, Kopitar. They are all within 20 adjusted points through first 9 seasons in the NHL. All those guys were good into their early to mid 30s. The numbers say Tavares is the safer bet.

Its the non elite players that carry a ton of risk on long term deals.

Plus the value you are getting now is insane. They added John Tavares for nothing. If it costs you a bit on the cap later thats the cost of doing business.
 
Statistically he is more likely to still be a very good player in 7 years than for everything to go wrong. He is comparable to guys like Sundin, Turgeon, Thornton, Staal, Datsyuk, Kopitar.

-Pierre Turgeon fell off of a cliff after 31
-Datsyuk never scored more than 70 points after 30 after putting up no less than 87 for 4 straight seasons prior
-Thornton declined from a ~1.15 ppg player to a ~.9 ppg player between 28-32
-Kopitar has been .65ppg in 2 of the last 3 seasons after being .8-.9. His 1.12 last season was awesome, but it looks like a speed bump on what was a steady decline otherwise.
-Staal was a .9-1.1 ppg monster up until the age of 28 and has had one season over .8 since and 2 seasons under .7

Across the board all of these spectacular hockey players shed .2ppg or more and a couple ran into significant durability issues during those same years.

The outlier there is that Mats Sundin was blessed by the gods of ridiculous consistency. He was .9 PPG as a 29 yr old, and then never again until he was 37 and sat out half of a season..93-1.05 every year like clockwork. If you omit his first and last years, he had one season above 1.15 (1.43) and 0 seasons under .9, just incredible stuff.

With that out of the way, bringing out the comparables underlines exactly what I'm trying to say. All of those guys are studs. John Tavares is a stud. But all of those guys (other than Mats) had significant levels of decline over the years we're paying John Tavares for. Which is cool...depending on how quick the decline is. If JT is that slightly better version of Kadri for the last 3-4 years of the contract, that shit is an albatross, full stop. JT would not be the first true contemporary of his to have that type of decline at that age and with his lack of skating (in a league that is trending towards speed), there's a significant chance that we're going to be the proud own of a slightly better Nazem Kadri not that long after our version of Nazem Kadri goes looking for bigger money elsewhere.

Keep in mind that JT plays a full season of this deal as a 34 yr old.

Its the non elite players that carry a ton of risk on long term deals.

Nah, it's not an either/or. Risk can be associated with any contract, "elite" or no. Value is value.

Plus the value you are getting now is insane.

No it's not. You're getting a fringe top 20 player in the league right now for the 2nd highest AAV. That's not insane value in a capped league, this is a variable I think that you continue to overlook. Insane value is Kucherov (1.64 ppg for 4.8 million), Johnny Hockey, Mackinnon, (omitting the obvious guys on their ELC as well).

If it costs you a bit on the cap later thats the cost of doing business.

Well, it all depends on how big that "bit" is. If that bit is JT performing like a fringe top line forward (which ~60 points is in most year), but he's being paid like a top 10 player, that's pretty crippling. We better have won a chip by then and I won't care. But if we haven't won a chip, we could have cap troubles that keep us from continuing to add needed pieces.
 
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I'll admit I was one of those against signing Tavares. But it wasn't because I thought he wasn't or wouldn't be a high-end player for us for at least the majority of his contract.

My main concerns were that we wouldn't be maximizing Nylander's potential by permanently keeping him on the wing instead of his natural position at center. And I also couldn't really figure out how we'd be able to sign Tavares for market value, while keeping all of Matthews, Marner & Nylander long-term and adequately addressing the right side of our defense.

Now, Dubas obviously thinks that those things won't be an issue, and I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt at the moment. But my main concerns are still unresolved. We've yet to find out how Nylander's career will play out over the long-term as a winger in this group. Marner & Matthews are still unsigned. And Hainsey and Zaitsev are still our top-2 RHD.

But for today, the bottom line is that this year's Leaf team is the best any of us have seen in our lifetimes. The most high-end talent, the best high-end talent and the deepest team. So I'm enjoying the ride this year.

As for Tavares, my opinion on him was that he was a comparable player to Mats Sundin, and I expected that kind of production from him---30+ goals/75+ points. So he's exceeded even those lofty expectations, even if playing with Mitch Marner obviously helps a lot. So we'll see---hopefully this kind of production will be a new normal for him when playing with other high-end players for at least the first few years, and hopefully it's a sign the cliff's not coming sooner than we'd like.
 
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