Weekly Takes - Monday, May 19 Edition

Weekly Takes - Monday, May 19 Edition

1. No three stars from the Maple Leafs disgusting, effortless, choke job of a performance against the Panthers in game five on Wednesday.

The worst performance of the Core Four era, which says a ton, given previous playoff performances. 

The Core Four is all but dead, with Mitch Marner a lock to walk in free agency. Brad Treliving cannot even offer him a contract.

Go let him score 100+ points somewhere else. You are not winning a Cup with him here in Toronto. 

This team finally roped people back in, only to remind everyone of who they have always been. 

Losers at their core. They have had their great moments, but they are fleeting. This is who they are, because this is who they have always been. 

2. The good news is this offseason will finally be different, because it has to be different. Marner is a free agent. John Tavares is a free agent. Brendan Shanahan’s contract expires.

Shanahan should not be brought back, as he oversaw a failure of an era, whether he brought the franchise back to relevancy or not. 

Marner should not be brought back, for obvious reasons. 

Tavares, I am 50/50 on as of this moment. He has to take a major pay cut. If he does, you have to explore bringing him back. You are already losing 100+ points with Marner. If you lose 30+ goals from Tavares as well, that is a lot of regular season production to replace. 

3. As of the start of the offseason, here is what the Maple Leafs are looking at…

Forwards…

Matthew Knies - Matthews - Vacant 

Easton Cowan - Vacant - William Nylander 

Bobby McMann - Max Domi - Vacant

Steven Lorentz - Scott Laughton - Pontus Holmberg  

Defence…

Jake McCabe - Chris Tanev 

Morgan Riley - Brandon Carlo 

Oliver Ekman-Larsson - Simon Benoit 

Goalies…

Anthony Stolarz 

Joseph Woll

Brad Treliving has had an amazing last 10 months overhauling the defence and goaltending (Tanev, Carlo, OEL, and Stolarz), to the point where the defence and goaltending are set heading into the summer. (Outside of the team possibly exploring a Riley trade, but I do not think that will happen.)

That is great, because all of his intentions can now go towards rebuilding the forward group, a group he has largely ignored since getting here. (Only four forwards dressing for the Leafs in the playoffs are Treliving players.)

That is not a knock on Treliving either, as he did an amazing job supporting what should have been an elite forward group. But the Core Four let him down and thus he must rebuild it. 

It is not going to be easy to fix, given the lack of prospects and draft picks, but he is going to have lots of cap space at his disposal. (He would have even more cap space if he traded David Kampf and Calle Jarnkrok, both of whom need to go. You cannot have players making what they make, rotating in and out of the press box.)

4. Free agent targets for the Maple Leafs at right wing and centre…

Centre…

1. Sam Bennett (2C)

2. Matt Duchene (2C)

Right Wing…

1. Brock Boeser (1RW)

2. Connor Brown (3RW)

It is a weak class. But the Leafs can offer money, the opportunity to play with star players, and to compete for a Cup. 

Maybe Florida and Dallas work their magic to keep Bennett and Duchene. But if not, Toronto has to be serious players. Change the dynamic of the team.

5. And at the end of the day, the dynamic of the team was always their downfall.

Kyle Dubas tried filling out the roster around the Core Four with young, skilled players. That did not work.

He then tried bringing in over-the-hill players in Joe Thornton, Jason Spezza, and Wayne Simmons to provide physicality and leadership. That did not work. 

Treliving then overhauled the defence and goaltending, a weak spot under Dubas due to Dubas’ failure to understand that big, large defenceman are more important coming playoff time than a puck moving defenceman in Timothy Liliegren who cannot handle a forecheck if his life depended on it. That did not work. 

None of it worked because 1) Dubas had no idea what worked come playoff time, and 2) The Core Four all play the same way. There is no diversity at the top of the lineup. (Outside of Knies bursting onto the scene.)

The Capitals eventually won by replacing Alex Semin at the top of their lineup with Tom Wilson. It is an extreme example, but you cannot have all of your highly-paid players be the same way. Not if they are all not wired to not want to run through a wall come playoff time. 

They have changed general managers. They have changed head coaches. They have overhauled the roster around the Core Four. Now it is time to blow up the Core Four.

6. As for Treliving, him and Craig Berube should be safe. I am confident in their ability to guide the Leafs forward. 

They should not hire a president to replace Shanahan. Let Treliving run the operations and have him report directly to Keith Pelley. The idea of having a president was to have someone be a buffer between ownership and the general manager. Pelley can be that buffer. 

7. My three stars from the Leafs predictable game six win over the Panthers on Friday…

1. Woll

2. Matthews 

3. Carlo 

A shameful game five performance, that led to everyone giving this team their last rites, only to win game six and rope everyone back in, was rather predictable. This is what they do. This core is now 6-1 all-time in bounce-back performances after “bad” playoff losses.

The true merit if we are all wrong about this team is a game seven victory. Nothing more, nothing less. They can show game five was nothing more than a slip up, just as they showed game five against the Senators was nothing more than a slip up. 

Whether or not they are capable of that is totally up to them, which is beautiful. Everything that has ever been said or written about this team can change with Matthews, Marner, and ‘co having the game of their lives on Sunday. 

Are they chokers? Do they have a killer instinct on the biggest stage? Can Matthews and Marner change the narratives around their legacy? 

We get to find out, and they get to write their own story.

Sports are a beautiful thing. Legacies will be cemented on Sunday, one way or another. 

8. No three stars from the Leafs horrific game seven loss to the Panthers.

This is who they are. This is who they were at the start of this journey a decade ago, it is who they were during the decade, and it is who they were at the end of the decade.

The regular season success, the “looking different” this season, and the fleeting series victories against Tampa Bay and Ottawa. All of it was simply moments.

At their core, The Core Four will represent the biggest failure in Toronto sports history. And thus the most hated.

They burst onto the scene when the city needed them the most. The Leafs were awful, and the Raptors were playoff failures. They represented hope. They represented something new. 

They had early success and got paid for it, squeezing the team of every last dollar, with Marner causing a social media firestorm to do so.

But all was going to be forgiven if they won. They did not win. So instead of Marner, a hometown, drafted and developed kid, finishing top two all-time in points, with his number hanging from the rafters, he is going to go down as the most despised, hated Maple Leaf in franchise history.

It is sad. But they did this to themselves. 

Rest in peace to Marner, Tavares, and Shanahan.

Rest in peace to the most stubborn era of Maple Leafs hockey.

And finally, at long last, rest in Peace to the Core Four.