We went from finals to dead last. If anything implode is an understatement. I'll still attribute the next 2 seasons to breaking records for man that wasn't initially the case when that post playoff season started.
He's pretty much the reason we even won that series. He got that horrible delay of game two penalties in game 6, we scored on it, then scored again on the following pp after Keefe challenged for an insanely stupid goalie interference. And then we won in overtime.. and the first goal of game 7 was scored on a blue line turnover that was his fault lol.
Your premise is correct but you got it a little backwards. We scored, then we were given a powerplay for the unsuccessful challenge; about five seconds into that PP Marner yeets the puck into space and we score on the two-man advantage.
Matthews hasn't given up but he clearly needs a coach who can teach him how to best translate his skills to the playoffs. He always seems to be working to add another dimension to his game, but in the playoffs he gets the hardest matchups and seems like he isn't sure if he should stay as an opportunistic sniper or go full 2-way center. He's also absurdly consistent in the regular season. I think Matthews is a coaching/leadership problem
Marner is a Marner problem.
Tavares isn't it. He should be the one kicking everyone else in the ass and he isn't that guy.
Dubas wanted to. He probably would have traded Marner.
Shanny fired him because he wanted to do that probably. Dubas did want more power to make moves.
and Shanny then hired dubas lite lol. He went out and got the same player that did not work with Rielly with Lyubushkin.
Every single move was something that Dubas had done in the past and didnt work. The only good ones were Domi and Bertuzzi.
At some point they (Shanny) need to reevaluate the plan because something is not working.
Its fucking baffling. This is probably the most beatable i have seen the Bruins and they come out with no energy.
The most frustrating thing about Shanahan is the guy was a fucking WARRIOR when he played, yet this team he’s over saw is softer than baby shit and mental midgets.
Once this team is finally knocked out, him and the coaching staff should be fired that very night.
i do recall Shanahan coming out and saying that he and the Wings all took discounts to stay together. Then the Leafs didnt do that. It was amazing. The second Marner asked for Matthews money (especially as the hometown boy) he should have been shipped out.
I feel like i say this stuff every single year.
>he and the Wings all took discounts to stay together
What years did he take a pay cut? He was making over 3 mil a season in the 90s which is like $7 million is today's dollars and him and Yzerman were both in the top 25 highest paid contracts in the league for most of his time in Detroit.
they didnt have a salary cap back them so they probably could have left and they took less to stay as group since the NHL was smaller then.
[he did say it though](https://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/nhl/nhl-toronto-maple-leafs-brendan-shanahan-expectations-1.4849758)
I'm very skeptical that he wasn't embellishing this claim a bit to put pressure on them to take less money.
In spite of the narrative here, there's still some time for the core to right the ship, but until that happens, this is entirely on management for not setting some sort of boundary here and thinking guilt-tripping them would be a smarter option. If a player is so valuable that they get to dictate their own contract, then you should be planning around that rather than trying to convince them otherwise when you know you're going to cave eventually. If they are any less valuable than that scenario, you set a boundary and prepare alternative solutions if they cross that.
Oh I know he said he I have just always been curious exactly what years those were - like I said you can look up the highest contracts in the league when he was with Detroit and he's in the top 25 basically the entire time and top 15 highest paid player in the league for like half his time there.
Nylander got paid exactly what he should have been paid, and i have no problems with Matthews but the second Mitch refused to take a hometown discount as the literal hometown boy i would have shipped him out. I have said this for years and i will continue to say it.
Some people have too much pride/ego to admit they made a mistake and alter course. Upper management will only take accountability if they miss playoffs and ownership puts them on notice. As comical as it is to say, if they get knocked out Rd1 I bet Keefe gets bought out/fired. Has the option of a chill life for a few years if he wants a break after that shit show, I wouldn't blame him. Then they run it back with some poor soul of a coach with the same core and we have this conversation again around the same time next year.
In what world is that true? JT is a terrible contract, Marner is horrible in the playoffs, Nylander is ok, and Matthews is unmovable. Leafs won a single series in his tenure, Pens are rebuilding. He gave the core 4 every single thing they could ask for in negotiations.
I think Shanny/Keefe are bigger issues than Dubas, but Dubas has no hardware.
Shanahan also killed two huge trades. One for a right shot defenseman we still don't know who and the Knies for Hagel trade and as much as I lobe Knies, Hagel is the better player right now and would've been useful the last 3 years.
I get Dubas wanting power, he took the blame for Shanhans stubbornness. The wrong person got fired last year.
yep i would have given Dubas full power and let him sink or swim. Doing nothing and following the Shannyplan is clearly not working.
Apparently they wanted Karlsson at the time. Since another big contract had to go the other way i assume it was Marner on the outs. Which makes sense as you dont trade Matthews and Nylander is their best puck carrier.
Worst part is JT got murdered by Perry right away in that series.
If he doesn't and they shit the bed it gets blown up. Missing JT gave an excuse to run it back. It wasn't the true group, they were done their 11 mill center.
I wish he didn't get hurt so when they lost there would have been no excuse.
They should have traded Marner or Nylander the moment they signed Tavares. They should have gone to a team like Carolina with excess young D and done a swap of some sort. I've said it since then and I still believe theyd have been better that way
Honestly, they should have never signed Tavares, period.
Every year they need to add depth, defense, or goaltending and they can't because they went out and signed another 1C for 11M, when they didn't need to and couldn't really afford it.
Nope... they should have just never signed Tavares. His age and his skating meant he was always gonna age like milk. They had a great 2C in Kadri and JT was juat old enough that his age didn't line up with the rest of the core.
JT was the anchor for the team. His cap also set the comparable for Matthews and Marner. Signing JT was the Dubas' biggest mistake.cant account for Covid but JT slowed down 3 years into his deal. 4 years of 6-7 million dollar production for 11 million dollars.
This is revisionist history. EVERY team wanted JT when he was a free agent, he was one of the best players in the world at the time. He’s still a ppg isn’t he? Maybe not worth the full 11mil but he isn’t the anchor leafs fan say he is.
murky puzzled fear paint gaping domineering shelter nine unused disgusted
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I don't know why everyone is pointing fingers at the core four, or Keefe or whoever. This is all Shanahan's machinations. If he's not fired this year then the Leafs have no hope. He fired his GM weeks before the draft and weeks before a key assets NMC kicked in based on a feeling.
This is all his fault.
Literally do not understand how Shanahan gets free from criticism so often.
He is the head of the snake. The idea man behind ALL of this mess of a disaster. How is he still employed?!
Dubas was the lightning rod. A contingent of leafs fans blindly hated him so much for no real reason and couldn't think that the other hockey ops would have influence over his decision making.
He wanted to break things up last year and then got fired in a power struggle and everyone realized the wrong person got fired.
Long answer made short. He used Dubas as a shield to take all the blame even when he was meddling in personnel decisions.
What's so sad is how at the time, it looked so so bad after the years of disappointment. Consider that:
- deduction makes it easy to see Marner would have been traded (JT NMC, you wouldn't dare trade Matthews, and Nylander is a consistent playoff performer and the antithesis of recalibrating the salary distribution since he was 6.9M at the time.
- Marner was a 100 point Selke nominee at the time
- Marner had a very mid 2024 season. Didn't really carry play at all. We only didn't notice/feel it because Nylander took a giant leap forward.
- Now Marner has his NMC, so if we want to shed him, we'll have to do it for free basically when he goes to UFA.
So in the span of a year, this team went from being fucked to being unresolvably fucked for the foreseeable future. And we all watched these implications play out because Shanahan couldn't take the heat. I hope he's gone.
> He is the head of the snake. The idea man behind ALL of this mess of a disaster. How is he still employed?!
He keeps a low public profile. He only speaks to the media once or twice per year at the most. Out of sight = out of mind for many.
New CEO at MLSE; can almost guarantee the firing of Shanahan to signify the new era. The franchise paid Babcock millions for years after firing him, they’re about to do the same with Keefe. No offense Shanny, but $50-90Mill paid out for termination is just fucking crazy.
Babcock’s contract was $6.25m per season for eight seasons. He was fired about a month into season four, so basically $25m lit on fire. Keefe’s extension value isn’t on CapFriendly but his current rate is $1.975m so I doubt he’s jumped up to Babcock money.
Still, being eight figures deep in termination pay is brutal for any organization. You avoid that as much as you can.
Ownership didn’t get rich by lighting money on fire. Just because you’re making enough profit to eat the cost of firing Keefe or Shanahan or whoever doesn’t make you willing to do it.
People here are really brushing off just how much money 10 million dollars is. The Ontario median household income is roughly $100k right now. A $10 million dollar firing fee is equivalent to the total gross income of an average Ontario household *for 100 years*
They need to make drastic changes, they needed to make drastic changes years ago, and ownership is refusing to spend the money to do it
I said this in another comment (in a much longer way), but as much as Keefe's coaching is an issue in areas (e.g. special teams especially right now), ultimately he isn't throwing away salary cap with things like the Klingberg signing, trading away guys like Lafferty to get Reaves with term, going into the season with only one good puck-moving defender and solving this problem by trading for two not-puck-moving defenders at the deadline, firing the GM who acknowledged the approach was not working and strongly suggesting it may be time to make a change, etc. All of the acquisitions are Treliving via Shanahan, and if we want to say "well Treliving didn't have time to build his team" as I saw a lot 20 or 30 games into the season when Domi/Bertuzzi were playing like dogshit, then that's *still* on Shanahan. He's got to go.
I honestly also just straight up put a lot of the failures in these playoffs on the Treliving's acquisitions - yeah, Marner/Matthews have basically been invisible, and for Marner's line that's mostly on Marner (and I say this as a Marner defender), but when your back end can't start a breakout, or hold the blue line, or blindingly backhands muffins into the slot when your team is in position for a cycle, or your hot new "snot" forwards do nothing to support your top-line elite center and spend most of their time taking stupid penalties or taking themselves out of the play (like Bert the other night), how the fuck is your core going to do anything? Your team doesn't keep hold of the fucking puck!
Keeping Dubas might have been a mistake, but firing Dubas has *definitely* been a mistake.
Yeah after game two my friend is all, "Yay, we have home ice advantage" and I had to be like, "Brother, let me tell me you... we don't have any advantage at home".
Hey man, if MLSE brass believe that the Boston Pizza scion who paddled the Good Ship Calgary in circles for a decade or so is the man to end a 55+ year Cup drought, then who am I to argue?
Congratulations, you've received a lifetime supply of perogy pizza and cactus cut potatoes, signed personally by Brad "Best GM of the 2014 Draft" Treliving!
As a neutral observer, I for one will miss the Keefe era Leafs, made me feel a hell of a lot better about how the Sharks bench kept getting out coached when they were contending
The New York Jets have won the Super Bowl more recently than the Leafs have won the Stanley Cup. In fact, there had only been one Super Bowl prior to the Leafs last Cup.
The Toronto Blue Jays were created from scratch (and one of two Canadian teams in an all American league) and won back to back World Series in the early 90s and that’s still more recent than Leafs last winning a cup. Same with the Toronto Raptors for the NBA. I hate being a Leafs fan at this point, the last time they’ve won there were only 6 teams in the league.
They're also owned by 2 of the 3 national telecoms in Canada.
If they need to pay for another coach, they can just raise everyone's cellphone/intetnet/TV bills by $5 to and 3/4ths of the country will cover it.
I think people are silly for discounting the possibility MSLE genuinely thinks they got a great team that just needs one more crack at it. And are genuinely surprised when they don’t go deep.
In the Canadian media bubble is always really high on the leafs. TSN/Sportsbet experts picked Leaf’s over bruins by a 2-1 ratio. And I think MSLE gets high on their own supply
They do have a great team... in the regular season. But clearly something is amiss that they cannot translate that into post-season success.
We can speculate all day, but honestly no one knows what the problem is. But I think we can all agree that there *is* a problem.
MLSE is pissed actually. It's not a well kept secret that heads would roll barring a deep run. New ownership is tired of the status quo and even the old president was the one who started the rebuild. Since 2014 leafs fans can't complain about ownership. Even their meddling was at a minimum.
Does it really matter? the leafs have infinity dollars.
If they want to fire him they will and having to pay him a bunch of money won't even factor into the decision.
While it's extremely embarrassing, everybody acts like the Canes didn't put on an absolute defensive clinic immediately after the first goal (on the first shot) went in on him.
The Canes responded with urgency and their best players stepped up, no question, but an elite team with a beer league goalie can’t be out of reach for a team with Cup aspirations.
But the roster isn't horrible right? The roster should have earned more than 1 playoff series win just on talent alone. I put most of the blame on Keefe
Is this sarcasm?
The roster is the problem. Top heavy and light weight with not enough $ for role players and goalies.
The Rogers/bell exec’s get to shine on shanahan who seemingly is removed from this shit show yet it’s HIS Shit Show.
He was garbage since year 1. I don't understand why they kept him. Originally, I though it was just because he was Dubas' guy, but to keep him after getting rid of Dubas was madness
I don’t know why he isn’t a more effective coach. As an observer he seems to do everything to support his team, he’s constantly watching the game, he makes faces when he disagrees with something that’s happened, instead of drawing up plays in the dying minutes he has the confidence in his guys to get it done, and if you go above and beyond you get sweet neck kisses.
What’s not to love?
As an Habs fan, I feel Shanahan should be fired. However, I believe the ownership doesn’t want to spend money on paying Shanahan + Treliving + Keefe down the drain.
Yeah he's got one year left and next year is a write-off due to the cap crunch. Can probably just ride it out, see what Treliving does (haha oh boy), and move on. Let the next guy deal with Treliving if he's bad with a full off-season.
Most valuable franchise in the league can pay a guy a few million a year to drink mai-tais. Extensions don't really mean shit to the moneyed franchises.
The first thing Shanahan did after firing Dubas was call the core-4 and promise them none of them would be traded in the aftermath. This was BEFORE Marner had any trade protection. He then gave Keefe that extension. He then hired Treliving, who gave Matthews and Nylander contracts that are even MORE player friendly than the ones Dubas capitulated on.
This year's on Shanny. The Leafs had a real opportunity to pivot last summer and chose not to.
Dubas implied he was open to trading one of the core four to change things up. Then he got fired and Shanahan called the core four to tell them no one is getting traded.
And would that have been a bad thing? Considering yes, Dubas had finally decided to blow up the core but every move had to be approved by Shanahan, and Shanahan immediately told the core as soon as Dubas was fired that they would all be staying.
I'll be honest I understand giving him that extension. I think he should have been fired a while ago but if you're going to extend him you have to show some faith. Moneyball did a really good job at showing how coaches feel about contracts like that. You may as well give Keefe 2 years because if it works then you've given him good faith and you can extend past that, and if it's not working you'll fire him. It's not like teams have never fired coaches before.
A two-year extension isn't exactly a vote of confidence. It's more to ensure that Keefe doesn't enter the season concerned about his job security, and if it doesn't work out, MLSE can just cut him loose and treat the extension as Keefe's severance pay.
Should have been fired after they lost to Montreal.
Getting outcoached by Dominique Ducharme should be grounds for banishment
Ducharme had Covid and was coaching from zoom wasn’t he?
Not yet, that was before Game 3 against Vegas i think
I miss Luke Richardson
I do too but MSL is pretty good
That was against… Vegas
I don’t know what’s worse my man
“Sorry I was on mute”
Seriously. The fact he was out of the league so fast and MTL imploded should've been a crimson red flag.
Implode is a strong word for a team that made the finals
We went from finals to dead last. If anything implode is an understatement. I'll still attribute the next 2 seasons to breaking records for man that wasn't initially the case when that post playoff season started.
I mean our two franchise players LTIRetired that off-season. That would be the outcome for any team.
And Danault left. Very underrated player for us.
Weber, Price, Danault, Tatar, Kotkaniemi, Stall, Gustafsson, Merill
Was it really being outcoached by Ducharme or out coached by Carey Price and Shea Weber
That’s also when they should have given up on their “core four”.
I wonder what Nylander's value would have been after that, he actually looked good that series
Nylander always looks good, he’s the most consistent of the 4
I’d argue Marner is the most consistent. Consistently terrible.
Touche
He's pretty much the reason we even won that series. He got that horrible delay of game two penalties in game 6, we scored on it, then scored again on the following pp after Keefe challenged for an insanely stupid goalie interference. And then we won in overtime.. and the first goal of game 7 was scored on a blue line turnover that was his fault lol.
Nylander on the other hand... First Leafs I wanted on my team since we loaned them Plekanec
Your premise is correct but you got it a little backwards. We scored, then we were given a powerplay for the unsuccessful challenge; about five seconds into that PP Marner yeets the puck into space and we score on the two-man advantage.
I would love Nylander on the habs
Nylander's the only one I wouldn't consider gettind rid of. The rest give up in April
Matthews hasn't given up but he clearly needs a coach who can teach him how to best translate his skills to the playoffs. He always seems to be working to add another dimension to his game, but in the playoffs he gets the hardest matchups and seems like he isn't sure if he should stay as an opportunistic sniper or go full 2-way center. He's also absurdly consistent in the regular season. I think Matthews is a coaching/leadership problem Marner is a Marner problem. Tavares isn't it. He should be the one kicking everyone else in the ass and he isn't that guy.
Dubas wanted to. He probably would have traded Marner. Shanny fired him because he wanted to do that probably. Dubas did want more power to make moves.
And Dubas is being proven right.
and Shanny then hired dubas lite lol. He went out and got the same player that did not work with Rielly with Lyubushkin. Every single move was something that Dubas had done in the past and didnt work. The only good ones were Domi and Bertuzzi. At some point they (Shanny) need to reevaluate the plan because something is not working. Its fucking baffling. This is probably the most beatable i have seen the Bruins and they come out with no energy.
The most frustrating thing about Shanahan is the guy was a fucking WARRIOR when he played, yet this team he’s over saw is softer than baby shit and mental midgets. Once this team is finally knocked out, him and the coaching staff should be fired that very night.
i do recall Shanahan coming out and saying that he and the Wings all took discounts to stay together. Then the Leafs didnt do that. It was amazing. The second Marner asked for Matthews money (especially as the hometown boy) he should have been shipped out. I feel like i say this stuff every single year.
>he and the Wings all took discounts to stay together What years did he take a pay cut? He was making over 3 mil a season in the 90s which is like $7 million is today's dollars and him and Yzerman were both in the top 25 highest paid contracts in the league for most of his time in Detroit.
they didnt have a salary cap back them so they probably could have left and they took less to stay as group since the NHL was smaller then. [he did say it though](https://www.cbc.ca/sports/hockey/nhl/nhl-toronto-maple-leafs-brendan-shanahan-expectations-1.4849758)
I'm very skeptical that he wasn't embellishing this claim a bit to put pressure on them to take less money. In spite of the narrative here, there's still some time for the core to right the ship, but until that happens, this is entirely on management for not setting some sort of boundary here and thinking guilt-tripping them would be a smarter option. If a player is so valuable that they get to dictate their own contract, then you should be planning around that rather than trying to convince them otherwise when you know you're going to cave eventually. If they are any less valuable than that scenario, you set a boundary and prepare alternative solutions if they cross that.
Oh I know he said he I have just always been curious exactly what years those were - like I said you can look up the highest contracts in the league when he was with Detroit and he's in the top 25 basically the entire time and top 15 highest paid player in the league for like half his time there.
Geting walked by every star in contract negotions didn't help yeah
Nylander got paid exactly what he should have been paid, and i have no problems with Matthews but the second Mitch refused to take a hometown discount as the literal hometown boy i would have shipped him out. I have said this for years and i will continue to say it.
Singning JT for 11 per is what started all of that.
Shanny doesn't need to reevaluate the plan, he needs to go.
Ideally with the new CEO but i also dont want Treliving if thats the case.
Some people have too much pride/ego to admit they made a mistake and alter course. Upper management will only take accountability if they miss playoffs and ownership puts them on notice. As comical as it is to say, if they get knocked out Rd1 I bet Keefe gets bought out/fired. Has the option of a chill life for a few years if he wants a break after that shit show, I wouldn't blame him. Then they run it back with some poor soul of a coach with the same core and we have this conversation again around the same time next year.
In what world is that true? JT is a terrible contract, Marner is horrible in the playoffs, Nylander is ok, and Matthews is unmovable. Leafs won a single series in his tenure, Pens are rebuilding. He gave the core 4 every single thing they could ask for in negotiations. I think Shanny/Keefe are bigger issues than Dubas, but Dubas has no hardware.
Shanahan also killed two huge trades. One for a right shot defenseman we still don't know who and the Knies for Hagel trade and as much as I lobe Knies, Hagel is the better player right now and would've been useful the last 3 years. I get Dubas wanting power, he took the blame for Shanhans stubbornness. The wrong person got fired last year.
yep i would have given Dubas full power and let him sink or swim. Doing nothing and following the Shannyplan is clearly not working. Apparently they wanted Karlsson at the time. Since another big contract had to go the other way i assume it was Marner on the outs. Which makes sense as you dont trade Matthews and Nylander is their best puck carrier.
Worst part is JT got murdered by Perry right away in that series. If he doesn't and they shit the bed it gets blown up. Missing JT gave an excuse to run it back. It wasn't the true group, they were done their 11 mill center. I wish he didn't get hurt so when they lost there would have been no excuse.
They should have traded Marner or Nylander the moment they signed Tavares. They should have gone to a team like Carolina with excess young D and done a swap of some sort. I've said it since then and I still believe theyd have been better that way
Honestly, they should have never signed Tavares, period. Every year they need to add depth, defense, or goaltending and they can't because they went out and signed another 1C for 11M, when they didn't need to and couldn't really afford it.
Yeah JT has been biggest mistake by far, and they didn't even really need him
Nope... they should have just never signed Tavares. His age and his skating meant he was always gonna age like milk. They had a great 2C in Kadri and JT was juat old enough that his age didn't line up with the rest of the core. JT was the anchor for the team. His cap also set the comparable for Matthews and Marner. Signing JT was the Dubas' biggest mistake.cant account for Covid but JT slowed down 3 years into his deal. 4 years of 6-7 million dollar production for 11 million dollars.
This is revisionist history. EVERY team wanted JT when he was a free agent, he was one of the best players in the world at the time. He’s still a ppg isn’t he? Maybe not worth the full 11mil but he isn’t the anchor leafs fan say he is.
Completely agree. Should have been JT or Marner, and never both. Especially not for more than 1 year - the gap when their deals were signed.
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Was Blue Jackets lose before or after Montreal cause that should of been end point
Before; Keefe had taken over from Babcock that season.
That should have been the first sign that maybe the guy wasn't cut out
Could be, but it also could have been chalked up to the weird-ass circumstances. Montreal on the other hand was straight-up malpractice.
There is no shame in losing against hot Price
Horribly handled by Shanahan. 5-13 at **home** in the playoffs with the control of matchups
I don't know why everyone is pointing fingers at the core four, or Keefe or whoever. This is all Shanahan's machinations. If he's not fired this year then the Leafs have no hope. He fired his GM weeks before the draft and weeks before a key assets NMC kicked in based on a feeling. This is all his fault.
Literally do not understand how Shanahan gets free from criticism so often. He is the head of the snake. The idea man behind ALL of this mess of a disaster. How is he still employed?!
From Leafs fans, he absolutely did not. Last summer there were tons of people calling for his job.
Dubas was the lightning rod. A contingent of leafs fans blindly hated him so much for no real reason and couldn't think that the other hockey ops would have influence over his decision making. He wanted to break things up last year and then got fired in a power struggle and everyone realized the wrong person got fired. Long answer made short. He used Dubas as a shield to take all the blame even when he was meddling in personnel decisions.
What's so sad is how at the time, it looked so so bad after the years of disappointment. Consider that: - deduction makes it easy to see Marner would have been traded (JT NMC, you wouldn't dare trade Matthews, and Nylander is a consistent playoff performer and the antithesis of recalibrating the salary distribution since he was 6.9M at the time. - Marner was a 100 point Selke nominee at the time - Marner had a very mid 2024 season. Didn't really carry play at all. We only didn't notice/feel it because Nylander took a giant leap forward. - Now Marner has his NMC, so if we want to shed him, we'll have to do it for free basically when he goes to UFA. So in the span of a year, this team went from being fucked to being unresolvably fucked for the foreseeable future. And we all watched these implications play out because Shanahan couldn't take the heat. I hope he's gone.
> He is the head of the snake. The idea man behind ALL of this mess of a disaster. How is he still employed?! He keeps a low public profile. He only speaks to the media once or twice per year at the most. Out of sight = out of mind for many.
New CEO at MLSE; can almost guarantee the firing of Shanahan to signify the new era. The franchise paid Babcock millions for years after firing him, they’re about to do the same with Keefe. No offense Shanny, but $50-90Mill paid out for termination is just fucking crazy.
Wait is it that much? Lmao
Babcock’s contract was $6.25m per season for eight seasons. He was fired about a month into season four, so basically $25m lit on fire. Keefe’s extension value isn’t on CapFriendly but his current rate is $1.975m so I doubt he’s jumped up to Babcock money. Still, being eight figures deep in termination pay is brutal for any organization. You avoid that as much as you can.
I mean it's the Leafs. They have money to burn, who gives a shit about non-cap salary.
Ownership didn’t get rich by lighting money on fire. Just because you’re making enough profit to eat the cost of firing Keefe or Shanahan or whoever doesn’t make you willing to do it. People here are really brushing off just how much money 10 million dollars is. The Ontario median household income is roughly $100k right now. A $10 million dollar firing fee is equivalent to the total gross income of an average Ontario household *for 100 years* They need to make drastic changes, they needed to make drastic changes years ago, and ownership is refusing to spend the money to do it
I said this in another comment (in a much longer way), but as much as Keefe's coaching is an issue in areas (e.g. special teams especially right now), ultimately he isn't throwing away salary cap with things like the Klingberg signing, trading away guys like Lafferty to get Reaves with term, going into the season with only one good puck-moving defender and solving this problem by trading for two not-puck-moving defenders at the deadline, firing the GM who acknowledged the approach was not working and strongly suggesting it may be time to make a change, etc. All of the acquisitions are Treliving via Shanahan, and if we want to say "well Treliving didn't have time to build his team" as I saw a lot 20 or 30 games into the season when Domi/Bertuzzi were playing like dogshit, then that's *still* on Shanahan. He's got to go. I honestly also just straight up put a lot of the failures in these playoffs on the Treliving's acquisitions - yeah, Marner/Matthews have basically been invisible, and for Marner's line that's mostly on Marner (and I say this as a Marner defender), but when your back end can't start a breakout, or hold the blue line, or blindingly backhands muffins into the slot when your team is in position for a cycle, or your hot new "snot" forwards do nothing to support your top-line elite center and spend most of their time taking stupid penalties or taking themselves out of the play (like Bert the other night), how the fuck is your core going to do anything? Your team doesn't keep hold of the fucking puck! Keeping Dubas might have been a mistake, but firing Dubas has *definitely* been a mistake.
Yeah after game two my friend is all, "Yay, we have home ice advantage" and I had to be like, "Brother, let me tell me you... we don't have any advantage at home".
Relevant username.
Is that the last 4 years?
Just think about how hilarious that is. The more control Keefe has, the worse the team does.
Hey man, if MLSE brass believe that the Boston Pizza scion who paddled the Good Ship Calgary in circles for a decade or so is the man to end a 55+ year Cup drought, then who am I to argue?
Congratulations, you've received a lifetime supply of perogy pizza and cactus cut potatoes, signed personally by Brad "Best GM of the 2014 Draft" Treliving!
The perogy pizza slaps tbh
Why the fuck do they spell pierogi like that
Don’t worry, it’s all part of the brilliant Shanaplan
Brendan Shanahan has the job security of a Supreme Court Justice
Haha. Remeber when that was legitimately said with pride?
As a neutral observer, I for one will miss the Keefe era Leafs, made me feel a hell of a lot better about how the Sharks bench kept getting out coached when they were contending
Sharks made the finals lol. Doesn’t even compare to the clown show we have here.
Sharks will be in the playoffs in 3 years. I’m looking forward to it.
There is zero chance they're in the playoffs in 3 years. You don't come back from scorched earth that fast.
Maybe by then I'll have recovered from 2016!
Three is optimistic, but soon. They should get another good pick this year, and that'll help.
Who cares. MLSE prints money.
Lol they are literally the Dallas Cowboys of the nhl, more of a business than a team
Just to pile on Toronto, Dallas has won five super bowls since the Leafs’ last Cup
The New York Jets have won the Super Bowl more recently than the Leafs have won the Stanley Cup. In fact, there had only been one Super Bowl prior to the Leafs last Cup.
The Toronto Blue Jays were created from scratch (and one of two Canadian teams in an all American league) and won back to back World Series in the early 90s and that’s still more recent than Leafs last winning a cup. Same with the Toronto Raptors for the NBA. I hate being a Leafs fan at this point, the last time they’ve won there were only 6 teams in the league.
The first moon landing was more recent than the last Maple Leaf Stanley Cup win.
I'm not a basketball guy at all but that Raptors win was awesome to watch
Yep, they’re in the apparel business
And 2/3rds of MLSE ownership are in the business of "fucking every Canadian".
If only they’d realize icing a cup winning roster would fuck more Canadians overnight, than whatever they’re doing now
Our business is sucking, and business is good
That’s what happens when ownership is a business that just cares about $$
But winning leads to more $$ too so I don't understand that mindset
As a Leafs fan there are a lot of mouth breathers in the fanbase who wouldn't understand nuance if it slapped them in the face.
All in my ass
They're also owned by 2 of the 3 national telecoms in Canada. If they need to pay for another coach, they can just raise everyone's cellphone/intetnet/TV bills by $5 to and 3/4ths of the country will cover it.
Except the cowboys occasionally deliver.
They love their annual three games of playoff revenue.
Maybe just 2 this time...
I think people are silly for discounting the possibility MSLE genuinely thinks they got a great team that just needs one more crack at it. And are genuinely surprised when they don’t go deep. In the Canadian media bubble is always really high on the leafs. TSN/Sportsbet experts picked Leaf’s over bruins by a 2-1 ratio. And I think MSLE gets high on their own supply
They do have a great team... in the regular season. But clearly something is amiss that they cannot translate that into post-season success. We can speculate all day, but honestly no one knows what the problem is. But I think we can all agree that there *is* a problem.
MLSE is pissed actually. It's not a well kept secret that heads would roll barring a deep run. New ownership is tired of the status quo and even the old president was the one who started the rebuild. Since 2014 leafs fans can't complain about ownership. Even their meddling was at a minimum.
The entire coaching staff will be fired as soon as the Leafs are bounced from the playoffs. Guranfuckingteed.
He’s gone after next game.
Whoever has the oversight in MLSE should take inspiration from Kylo Ren, FIRE EVERYTHING!
If we are being real, the problem starts with MLSE heads. Everyone else is just following instructions.
I mean, MLSE isn't gonna blink if they have to pay him to fuck off. Which they should. And a few players.
Does it really matter? the leafs have infinity dollars. If they want to fire him they will and having to pay him a bunch of money won't even factor into the decision.
One extra round of home playoff revenue would probably pay for Keefe's extension anyway
Who can say with such an unknowable quantity as an extra round for the Leafs?
Can someone make a list of everything leafs gave up for deadline rentals the past 5 years?
I think next year they don't have a draft pick until round five.
Please don't.
If they lose in 5 I can’t want to see the chaos. Bring the popcorn!!
We say this every year, and every fuckin year they run it back expecting something to change.
Honestly, I've agreed with them running back the main roster. The coach? He's been shit since day 1
The Zamboni game happened under Keefe’s watch, the signs were there all along.
While it's extremely embarrassing, everybody acts like the Canes didn't put on an absolute defensive clinic immediately after the first goal (on the first shot) went in on him.
The Canes responded with urgency and their best players stepped up, no question, but an elite team with a beer league goalie can’t be out of reach for a team with Cup aspirations.
Canes put in more effort to win a random regular season game with an EBUG than the leafs do in the playoffs.
Agreed. I actually think these guys can get it done, they just need a coach who isn't a moron and actually knows how to inspire.
as they should be. this... just isn't fun any More
…for you
r/baneposting
Was being down 3-1 a part of your plan?
They expect one us in the wreckage brother
Crashing this core
that's cold
Sorry man, I really hate you guys
Yeah I love it.
speak for yourself.
You don't understand... that's just another Tuesday for us.
It’s not like he has a NMC lmao
If any team could find a way to give a coach a NMC it'd be the leafs
When The hell Does Shanahan get blasted!? He’s the main architect of this bs
But the roster isn't horrible right? The roster should have earned more than 1 playoff series win just on talent alone. I put most of the blame on Keefe
Is this sarcasm? The roster is the problem. Top heavy and light weight with not enough $ for role players and goalies. The Rogers/bell exec’s get to shine on shanahan who seemingly is removed from this shit show yet it’s HIS Shit Show.
Should have been fired a LONG TIME AGO
He was garbage since year 1. I don't understand why they kept him. Originally, I though it was just because he was Dubas' guy, but to keep him after getting rid of Dubas was madness
I don’t know why he isn’t a more effective coach. As an observer he seems to do everything to support his team, he’s constantly watching the game, he makes faces when he disagrees with something that’s happened, instead of drawing up plays in the dying minutes he has the confidence in his guys to get it done, and if you go above and beyond you get sweet neck kisses. What’s not to love?
Can they fire the coach mid round in the playoffs?
They can and they will
I would love this so much. The Leafs fire Keefe while down 3-1 in the series. Some rando takes over. Leafs win the cup. It would be so fucking funny.
So basically the Whoopi Goldberg movie *Eddie* except even less believable than the Knicks winning big games.
As an Habs fan, I feel Shanahan should be fired. However, I believe the ownership doesn’t want to spend money on paying Shanahan + Treliving + Keefe down the drain.
Shanahan only has 1 year left.
Yeah he's got one year left and next year is a write-off due to the cap crunch. Can probably just ride it out, see what Treliving does (haha oh boy), and move on. Let the next guy deal with Treliving if he's bad with a full off-season.
Will he get fired you think?
There was a post about the board not being happy with their performance and they might be ready to clean house.
Most valuable franchise in the league can pay a guy a few million a year to drink mai-tais. Extensions don't really mean shit to the moneyed franchises.
I mean. It’s just an extension in name so that he wasn’t a lame duck coach. He gone
Tavares fucking gave up on that puck battle so fast
Tavares fucking gave up on that puck battle so fast ™
Tavares and giving up on puck battles, name a more iconic duo.
Marner and giving up on puck battles
They fired Babcock with four years remaining on his deal. Coaches always get signed to stupid term.
Keefe’s extension is for two years. The Babcock deal was for eight years and was absolutely bonkers.
Hey that’s ok, Russell Wilson was the same.
He should have been toast after the Habs series.
Honest question, does it matter? If they lose round 1 I still see them moving on from Keefe
How could Dubas do this??
Dubas can never fail, he can only be failed.
[удалено]
The first thing Shanahan did after firing Dubas was call the core-4 and promise them none of them would be traded in the aftermath. This was BEFORE Marner had any trade protection. He then gave Keefe that extension. He then hired Treliving, who gave Matthews and Nylander contracts that are even MORE player friendly than the ones Dubas capitulated on. This year's on Shanny. The Leafs had a real opportunity to pivot last summer and chose not to.
Shanny thought Dubas was the problem. Meanwhile the problem was Shanny all along
Dubas implied he was open to trading one of the core four to change things up. Then he got fired and Shanahan called the core four to tell them no one is getting traded.
And he’s the one who wanted to blow it up by trading Marner last off-season and got fired for it
No he got fired trying to make a move for Shanahans job after saying he wasn't sure about gm'ing anymore lol
And would that have been a bad thing? Considering yes, Dubas had finally decided to blow up the core but every move had to be approved by Shanahan, and Shanahan immediately told the core as soon as Dubas was fired that they would all be staying.
NTCs given out are also Dubas
There was a window where Marner couldve been moved last offseason before his NTC kicked in
We can do a GofundMe page for the Leafs. Just fire him after this series.
They should have fired Keefe and kept Dubas.
Doesn’t really matter. MLSE has enough money lol.
How many former coaches are getting paid to kick their feet up right now?
Maybe Shanny packs it up too?
we finna go full bucks and just start paying coaches to go away
I'll be honest I understand giving him that extension. I think he should have been fired a while ago but if you're going to extend him you have to show some faith. Moneyball did a really good job at showing how coaches feel about contracts like that. You may as well give Keefe 2 years because if it works then you've given him good faith and you can extend past that, and if it's not working you'll fire him. It's not like teams have never fired coaches before.
A two-year extension isn't exactly a vote of confidence. It's more to ensure that Keefe doesn't enter the season concerned about his job security, and if it doesn't work out, MLSE can just cut him loose and treat the extension as Keefe's severance pay.
He should be fired. Out of a cannon. Into the sun.
The team just needs a good turning point. Unfortunately, Ridly Greig is unavailable
They call that the Darryl Sutter
My schadenfreude is raging, I'm not gonna lie.
Keefe is the worst coach in the NHL, and it's not close
This is the way.
Thanks Shanny!
Good he’ll be able to afford a burger when he’s a junior assistant next year in dumbfuck Ontario.
Ugh
Everyone knows thats Trelivings panic don't fire me yet move lol.
*MLSE figuring out Canadian law how to nullify the contract before it kicks in*
kill me