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GDT #59: TOR @ STL 8pm: O'Reilly's Curse

uncus said:
Marner sucked all game.
But I guess we should blame babcock for having him out there when he played like shit most of the game
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nope.

want our elite players out there at that point no matter how they've played.
 
zeke said:
nope.

want our elite players out there at that point no matter how they've played.
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There could be the argument you want your best elite players of that game to start, which would have been Matthews and Nylander but either way you win or lose with your best players.
 
Nice to see that with our 3rd line C injured, Matthews was able to get more icetime...



1.Marner 20:09
2.Hyman 20:08
3.Tavares 18:49
4.Kapanen 18:02
5.Matthews 16:52
6.Marleau 15:38
7.Johnsson 15:27
8.Nylander 15:19
9.Brown 14:06
10.Lindholm 9:06
11.Gauthier 7:41
12.Kadri 4:14

1.Rielly 22:01
2.Hainsey 21:00
3.Zaitsev 20:43
4.Gardiner 19:09
5.Muzzin 19:43
6.Dermott 17:12

lol.

p.s. lost the game by a goal.
 
Why add the SH time? Hyman played two minutes less than Tavares at ES, three less than Marner.

If you have an issue with ice time, it should be more about the lines and not about the individuals. Because the Matty line shouldn’t only be playing 16 minutes.

Anyway, as for the game itself, entertaining but wouldn’t been better if we came out of the gate strong. But good comeback, and just a little bad luck on the Marner pass in OT. Of all the times for him to miss...
 
Babcock did it to me again, I didn't watch a minute of tonight's game. I just cannot get interested enough to go upstairs and turn it on.

Lemme guess, a team with Tavares, Matthews, Marner, Nylander, Rielly, Buzzin and Kapanen, lost?

Lol.

Babcock has done the impossible with me. Made me lose interest in the blue and white.
 
since the trade:

Rielly 22:51
Hainsey 19:40
Gardiner 19:38
Zaitsev 19:02
Muzzin 18:43
Dermott 15:57

our coach is not well.
 
Once Babcock decides he doesn't like a player, it's good night. I don't think Muzzin's deteriorating play and his coach's obvious dislike are unrelated.

On pretty much any other team, Hyman would be fortunate to crack 15 minutes. On the Leafs, he's regularly pushing 20. Even less defensible is Marleau's usage. It's screamingly obvious to everyone but Mike that Patty is shell of his former self.

Aside from deployment, this team remains highly susceptible to a strong forecheck. Their breakouts are easily thwarted by teams that can apply good pressure down low. This has been the case for almost three years and the coaching staff has yet to find an answer to it.
 
BeLeafer said:
Once Babcock decides he doesn't like a player, it's good night. I don't think Muzzin's deteriorating play and his coach's obvious dislike are unrelated.

On pretty much any other team, Hyman would be fortunate to crack 15 minutes. On the Leafs, he's regularly pushing 20. Even less defensible is Marleau's usage. It's screamingly obvious to everyone but Mike that Patty is shell of his former self.

Aside from deployment, this team remains highly susceptible to a strong forecheck. Their breakouts are easily thwarted by teams that can apply good pressure down low. This has been the case for almost three years and the coaching staff has yet to find an answer to it.
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Muzzin has looked fine with Zaitsev

And his deployment is tied more to Babs stubbornness of wanting his LD/RD balance not his dislike of him. He has made it quite clear from the day of the trade he preferred a RHD.




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Artnes said:
Muzzin has looked fine with Zaitsev

And his deployment is tied more to Babs stubbornness of wanting his LD/RD balance not his dislike of him. He has made it quite clear from the day of the trade he preferred a RHD.
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The thing is, it's not just a LD/RD split that he's married to. Otherwise, left-handed Ron Hainsey playing the right side on the top pairing wouldn't be a thing.

Just like he thinks there needs to be a grunt on every forward line, I think Babcock believes that every defense pairing needs to have one guy who's a "puck-mover", and one purely defensive guy who "knows where to stand". And that the "puck-mover" on the pairing must never be on their off-side.

Heaven forbid we actually put two "puck-movers" on one of our top two pairings.
 
I don't know if that's true, because he is playing Gardiner-Dermott together, and initially tried Muzzin-Rielly to start, just didn't like Rielly on his off side.

The truth is there is no perfect combination for our D with Hainsey and Zaitsev in there. There are better ones, sure, namely anything that pushes Hainsey/Zaitsev down a pair whether its Dermott, Gardiner or Muzzin on the top pair.

But even still then you are left with 2/3 of year D with a dman that stinks with the puck. At the end of the day we had 3 terrible puck moving dmen and have only replaced one of them.
 
Since the trade:

First 6gms (4-1-1, +0.83gdiff)

Rielly 23:32, 5pts, +1, 54.2cf%, 54.7scf%
Muzzin 19:04, 4pts, +3, 55.5cf%, 53.9scf%

Gardiner 19:30, 3pts, +0, 52.0cf%, 56.5scf%
Zaitsev 19:06, 1pts, -3, 48.4cf%, 53.7scf%

Hainsey 20:11, 0pts, +4, 53.6cf%, 57.5scf%
Dermott 15:47, 2pts, +7, 58.9cf%, 60.8scf%


Dominant top pair, middling 2nd pair, great 3rd pair - probably could have started leaning more heavily on that 3rd pair going forward.

Note: the effect could have been even stronger if babcock had actually given Muzzin top pair minutes and not hilariously still given Hainsey big minutes even while playing on the bottom pair.


Last 4gms (2-1-1, +0.75gdiff)

Rielly 21:56, 2pts, -2, 46.0cf%, 37.7scf%
Hainsey 18:57, 0pts, -1, 44.6cf%, 37.9scf%

Zaitsev 19:01, 1pts, +4, 51.5cf%, 59.1scf%
Muzzin 18:15, 1pts, +2, 49.7cf%, 50.6scf%

Gardiner 19:50, 1pts, +0, 61.7cf%, 68.5scf%
Dermott 16:17, 0pts, -4, 50.6cf%, 53.5scf%

Right back to the top pair being a weakness again. Sweet.


We literally had our defense completely fixed, and coach decided to sabotage it again.

But hey, as long as Zaitsev looks better then it's all good.

Our coach has lost his marbles.
 
Volcanologist said:
I'm still clinging to the faint hope this is because we're doing stuff at the deadline.
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I'd like to cling to that hope too. But what makes that impossible for me is that Babcock's player usage in our last two playoff series really does seem to point to it being likely that he genuinely believes these pairings give us the best chance to win.

So, the only other hope I can cling to is that Dubas will find some way to fix this before the deadline, like shipping out Zaitsev and/or Hainsey.
 
LeafGm said:
I'd like to cling to that hope too. But what makes that impossible for me is that Babcock's player usage in our last two playoff series really does seem to point to it being likely that he genuinely believes these pairings give us the best chance to win.

So, the only other hope I can cling to is that Dubas will find some way to fix this before the deadline, like shipping out Zaitsev and/or Hainsey.
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My hope is that he shitcans Babcock and installs Keefe as the head coach. Fixing shit a la moneyball way to take his toys away will cost unncessary asset expenditures.
 
I've resisted the urge to advocate for canning Babcock thus far. But it is getting harder and harder to continue resisting.

I'm willing to give him this playoff run as 'grace'. Just because I am patient and generous like that. But if his usage does not change, and we lose, I'll be fully on the bandwagon. And Keefe would be the guy I want to replace him.
 
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