Agreed.

He was out sick with something too last week right?

If flu or COVID, boy let me tell you, I played a tournament 3 weeks removed from COVID and it was rough... just gassed all the time.

JT is the least of my concerns long-term with this team. If he wants to stick around and they can make the numbers work, great.

More concerned with Marner and what kind of astronomical cap hit he's going to be asking for.
- gravyface

They were talking about this on one of the drive time radio shows last night.

The general consensus was the Leafs should just say they aren't paying a dime more than what they gave Willie.

And I agree with that.

Agreed.

He was out sick with something too last week right?

If flu or COVID, boy let me tell you, I played a tournament 3 weeks removed from COVID and it was rough... just gassed all the time.

JT is the least of my concerns long-term with this team. If he wants to stick around and they can make the numbers work, great.

More concerned with Marner and what kind of astronomical cap hit he's going to be asking for.
- gravyface

Same here.

To be honest, it was still just up in my browser when I sat down to the computer this morning.

I was curling last night. Came off the ice, looked at the score: 4-0. I just laughed - whatta ya gunna do?
- Atomic Wedgie

I was really hoping they wouldnt leaf it last night.
But thats what i love about the leafs, just when everyone is like "this team looks different, this team has changed....as early as it may be....they look different". Then 24 hours later the leafs are like "moowahaha...GOTCHA!! We be the same!!"

It's probably unfair to judge him for his past few games, where he lost 8 lbs, but I'm still going to unfairly judge him.

I've already moved on emotionally from him.

I honestly wouldn't offer the guy more than $3M on his next contract. Yes, he can get double that elsewhere, but that's not Toronto's problem.

And although I haven't actually seen proof of it, these rumours that he's endorsing some stupid amulet for $300 really makes me think of him in a different way. He's either too stupid to know it's a scam, or he knows it's a scam and just wants to fleece people for money. Either way, I've lost a ton of respect for him as a human being.
- Atomic Wedgie

https://www.thestar.com/s...ef-9b50-b35db3c16997.html

Oh boy, fire him into the sun...

https://www.thestar.com/sports/leafs/this-magical-amulet-claims-to-protect-you-from-electromagnetic-radiation-why-are-john-tavares-rj/article_11074054-8c9e-11ef-9b50-b35db3c16997.html

Oh boy, fire him into the sun...
- gravyface

m'eh athletes are like everyone else - some of them believe in stupid poop. Personally I could care less and I don't see any kids begging their parents for this thing or asking Santa for it because JT endorses it.

I feel like the endorsement has been pretty quiet - I hadn't heard anything about it until i read it here.

The more I read people's opinions here the more I'm starting to agree maybe JT at 5 it too much and he should be treated more like Stamkos and lowballed at 3 or he can decide if he wants to go make more somewhere else or move to the front office.

I mean Stamkos did captain 2 cup winners after all and if he was only offered 5 is JT really worth 5?

I hope he goes full beast mode as the year goes on and I eat my hat on all of this but I don't see it happening.

https://www.thestar.com/sports/leafs/this-magical-amulet-claims-to-protect-you-from-electromagnetic-radiation-why-are-john-tavares-rj/article_11074054-8c9e-11ef-9b50-b35db3c16997.html

Oh boy, fire him into the sun...
- gravyface

Seriously?

JT doesn't know how to read or use a search engine?

I used to think he would be good in the Leafs front office somewhere, but there's enough magickal woo(frank)ery going on in there already. Nobody needs more of that.

new blog everyone

Agreed.

He was out sick with something too last week right?

If flu or COVID, boy let me tell you, I played a tournament 3 weeks removed from COVID and it was rough... just gassed all the time.

JT is the least of my concerns long-term with this team. If he wants to stick around and they can make the numbers work, great.

More concerned with Marner and what kind of astronomical cap hit he's going to be asking for.
- gravyface

I'm concerned that Treliving feels pressure to sign Marner. But I'm also considering that if Treliving and Berube are going to work together to build the best team they can as a management team, then the input on Marner's value has to also come from him.

He sees what we don't - how the team values him, what his contributions are and what his shortcomings are. The Leafs have their own internal analytics and statistics department that is likely measuring the harder to quantify things - like battles won/lost, play reads and so on.

At the end of the day they have to weigh what Marner is bringing to the table and decide if the negatives in his game outweigh the positives. It's too early to see how he's going to change and adapt under Berube - if at all. I don't want him banging and crashing into people. There's no point. He's not physically built to win those battles. But we need him engaged, in puck pursuit and taking pucks away from guys in engagement (which he has done well - tied for the league lead in takeaways with McDavid at this early stage of the season).

He has to work on not forcing a play that's not there and learning to not be "the guy" when the other team is on him. Don't make the risky pass, make the safe one and try again. He could use a bit more of Willy's patience and probably a bit more net drive - like we did see from him 2-3 years ago.

Another positive this season? Marner has been quite effective on the PK - Matthews has probably been the best, leading in most categories - but Marner not only has solid upper-half numbers in most suppression categories, but in the eye test he seems more posititonally sound and more engaged in this system.

The made the mistake of overpaying Willy. Does that mean they need to overpay Mitch now, too? Because if they do, they are going to push themselves further into the box that they've been trapped in for years.

https://www.thestar.com/sports/leafs/this-magical-amulet-claims-to-protect-you-from-electromagnetic-radiation-why-are-john-tavares-rj/article_11074054-8c9e-11ef-9b50-b35db3c16997.html

Oh boy, fire him into the sun...
- gravyface

People believe dumb things. If he or the multitude of other people who believe in this want to believe in it and its causing no harm. Then whatver imo.
No worse then someone believing "god" gave them their skills or watches over them.....well the amulet thing is nowhere near as bad as that.

They were talking about this on one of the drive time radio shows last night.

The general consensus was the Leafs should just say they aren't paying a dime more than what they gave Willie.

And I agree with that.
- Atomic Wedgie

I heard this as well and have been saying the same thing. There's no need to pay him more.

Ya you really went out on a limb there.

Stoopid Leafs


- Fakepartofme

Pages 1-3 on this page did not age well.

m'eh athletes are like everyone else - some of them believe in stupid poop. Personally I could care less and I don't see any kids begging their parents for this thing or asking Santa for it because JT endorses it.

I feel like the endorsement has been pretty quiet - I hadn't heard anything about it until i read it here.

The more I read people's opinions here the more I'm starting to agree maybe JT at 5 it too much and he should be treated more like Stamkos and lowballed at 3 or he can decide if he wants to go make more somewhere else or move to the front office.

I mean Stamkos did captain 2 cup winners after all and if he was only offered 5 is JT really worth 5?

I hope he goes full beast mode as the year goes on and I eat my hat on all of this but I don't see it happening.
- Cush29

Who knows, maybe they backed up a money truck and he was like, sure whatever, I'll peddle your amulets you dummies...

Pages 1-3 on this page did not age well.
- AdamFrench

In my defense, I was drunk on the Zezel Kool-Aid.

I suspect you're referring to Tavares - and I have to admit that as a fan I don't know if I'd want him back at any price. I mean obviously less than $3m to play 3rd line minutes? Maybe - but I'm being honest when I say that the role might be better filled by someone with more speed and who comes with less expectation. He's been getting his points but a lot of those are on the PP and I don't know if he's doing something that Knies couldn't, for example.

The year he arrived here he had a career high in 5v5 points with 60 (5th in the league), and since then (using an 82 game pace to provide context), he's been at 38, 44, 40, 38, 36 - and this year after 7 games, he's at a 41 point pace. For the most part, it should be noted, with the Islanders he averaged roughly in this same range his whole career but really these were his year-over-year paced to 82 games points: 25, 39, 48, 48, 51, 47, 47, 38, 39.

Since 5v5 is tricky to scope in terms of "but how does that compare?" - 40 points around 50th; 35 points is around 80th. 50 points is typically top-15. So there absolutely is a lot of wiggle room inside the framework of the "Yeah but he gets his points!" argument.

For me, I just don't feel he's battling like he used to and I don't know exactly what useful skills he's bringing with him. I'm probably being an ass, but really to me he loses most battles, he is bounced netfront too often, he's slow and on the other side he doesn't bring defense, physicality or penalty killing. If he were removed from PP1, I think he'd be a 30 point player and likely a negative 5v5 contributor in that his line would be outscored.

It's not the $11m question - it's the what does he bring and what is he actually worth to us in 2025-2026 under a Craig Berube led team?
- Monkeypunk

Facts.

Facts.
- Rare_Jewel

except its 55 point pace. basically the same as AM34

except its 55 point pace. basically the same as AM34
- drexel

Matthews, unlike Tavares, is not on the wrong side of 30.

It's why Tavares will actually finish closer to 55 (65 last year) and Matthews won't (107).