Weekly Takes - Monday, March 4 Edition

Weekly Takes - Monday, March 4 Edition 

1. My three stars in the Leafs loss to the Golden Knights on Tuesday…

1. Max Domi

2. Tyler Bertuzzi

3. Ryan Reaves

A 50/50 game that got away from the Leafs.

A truly awful game from the officials, too.

2. My three stars from the Leafs lacklustre win over the Coyotes on Thursday…

1. Joseph Woll

2. Mitch Marner

3. Auston Matthews

Woll was great in his return, while maybe the Bertuzzi and Reaves signings were not so bad after all. Reaves is not only doing what he needs to do from a physicality perspective, but he is a massive reason why the fourth line has played as well as it has as of late.

3. My three stars from the Leafs impressive win over the Rangers on Saturday…

1. Ilya Samsonov

2. Calle Jarnkrok

3. John Tavares

Another win against a true Stanley Cup contender. The Leafs are spoiling us with their Saturday night games as of late.

1. As for the Reaves-Matt Rempe fight: It was great.

A Saturday night in Toronto, between two original six teams vying for the Cup, and you have two heavyweights squaring off at centre ice. It was amazing.

But hopefully, Rempe settles into an actual role now that he has fought the league’s most feared fighter in Reaves. He does not need to prove to anyone that he is willing to fight. He has to slow down for his sake, because this has a tragic ending written all over it, more so given he does not know how to fight at all.

If he connects, his opponent is going down – no question. But he has gotten clocked far too many times in a short time span for this to be sustainable. 

1. I have no problem with trading for Ilya Lyubushkin, nor the return it took to trade for him.

The Leafs needed a big, right-shot defenceman who is physical and can kill penalties and Lyubushkin does all of that.

With that being said, Brad Treliving should continue his search for a partner for Morgan Riely, forcing Lyubushkin into a battle with Timothy Liljegren for third-pairing right-D.

1. Matt Chapman signing with the Giants closes the book on the worst offseason by a Toronto sports team in my lifetime.

I cannot fathom how Ross Atkins is banking on internal regression and internal regression alone. Criminal.

7. Josh Donaldson retires from baseball as one of its great competitors of all time.

The era of success that Toronto sports has seen since 2015 can be chalked back to the arrival of Donaldson to the city. He changed the culture and the standard. One of the greatest athletes the city has ever seen.

The next step is to add his name to the Level of Excellence, so that the next generation of Blue Jays fans never forget what he meant to this city.