I follow the NHL as a whole a lot less than I do the Thrashers.  That said, I am always curious to see how our former guys are doing around the league.  Obviously, in this case, I would be inquiring about Colby Armstrong and how all of you think he has been playing for your Leafs.  I always liked Colby, but sometimes on the ice I felt like his effort was a little less than 100%.  However, I also always felt like he never really wanted to be in Atlanta, and knew that once he had his opportunity to leave us he would.  Additionally, I always had a hunch he would choose to be a Leaf if given the chance.  Now that he has, I was wondering how you guys think he has played.  (I am aware that he was injured for part of the year).

Also, if you want to ask any questions about the Thrashers to a fan of the team prior to tomorrow's game, I shall do my best to provide answers. 

Thanks in advance, and while I hope our guys get the win, I wish you guys the best of luck.

In reading Godd Till's 6th day of Leafmas request I was struck by two things:

1. How long it's been since the Leafs played a game that actually, genuinely mattered. I'm not talking about late season nail biters to see if this team can squeak into the post-season. I'm talking about OT games with no threat of a shootout, or the thrill and tension of a game 7 where an entire season is on the line.
2. How does the Leafs current five year drought (sure to be six next April) stack up against the rest of the NHL?

So  I decided to look at all 30 NHL teams and their longest post-season drought since the league expanded in 1967: 

 

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Leaf’s Fans I have had a chance to watch Matt Frattin play for the UND Fighting Sioux for 3 seasons and I think you’re going to like what Matt Frattin brings to the table. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if he is wearing a Maple Leaf next season.

 

Matt Frattin is a big strong power forward (6 feet 206 lbs) and has a howitzer for a shot, Frattin shots the puck through goaltenders, and you can find many goals on YouTube.com. Frattin isn’t a one dimensional player, Matt plays strong in all three zones of the ice and his skating are one of his stronger points.

 

Matt Fratt was drafted by the Toronto Maple Leafs in the 4th round of the 2007 NHL Entry Draft. Just before the 2009-2010 school year was about to begin Matt Frattin got into trouble and was dismissed from the Fighting Sioux hockey team and returned to Edmonton, Alberta to get his life in order. At the semester break Frattin was given a second chance by Fighting Sioux head coach Dave Hakstol and Matt has caught fire and is on a torrid pace. Grand Forks Herald beat writer Brad Schlossman has a nice article about Matt’s past few seasons.

 

Grand Forks Herald --- Matt Frattin is a notorious prankster. So, when he called Evan Trupp last August to say that he had gotten in trouble and was getting kicked off the UND hockey team, Trupp naturally thought it was a joke.

But this time, it wasn’t.

After his second alcohol-related run-in with police in two months — this time a DUI charge he later would be acquitted of — Frattin was dismissed just days before the 2009-10 school year was set to start.

He packed up and moved back home to Edmonton, Alberta, to ponder his future. And while UND left the door open for his return in 2010-11, it seemed likely that his time in Grand Forks was finished.

After all, the easy route was for Frattin to cash in on the NHL contract that the Toronto Maple Leafs offered and pick up his hockey career right away in the pro ranks. Frattin thought about it, and took a different path.

He decided to change his lifestyle, sit out for up to a year and attempt to return to UND to make things right. He’s back here now, 16 months later, on his road to redemption. Frattin is the nation’s leading goal-scorer, with 17 goals, and it’s not even Christmas.

So how hot has Frattin been, Matt has scored 11 goals in 13 games last season from Feburary 12th to March 27. Fast forward to this season Frattin has continued that torrid pace scoring 17 goals in 20 games, so if my math is right (I am a sociology major), that is roughly 28 goals in 33 games. [click to link]

For more from Eric check out Goon's World...

Jonas Siegel has a great blog post up today listing 10 games this season where the Leafs gave up a cluster of goals in a very short time. For those of you scoring at home, that means the Leafs have been torched for multiple goals in three minutes or less in 30% of their games this season.

I wanted to take Jonas' nice research one step further and add a goaltending column to see if there was any sort of pattern...

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I have the misfortune to live with two Habs fans and I notice they read a blog called Four Habs Fans (Editor's Note: They are friends of the site so feel free to patronize them) religiously. To be perfectly clear I do not approve of emulating Habs fans in general, for the record.  However, I do notice that they have nicknames for virtually every player which I think is one of the keys to the real fan experience (especially if your team employs a number of players whose names are hard to pronounce).

It just seems like there aren't enough good nicknames for the current batch of Leafs players other than possibly "The Monster" for Gustavsson and "Uzi" for Gunarsson. I'd like to present a couple of my own and open up the discussion on what ideas people have.  Personally I love calling Brett Lebda "The Boogie Man" because he terrifies me every time he's on the ice. On a more obscure note and one of my roommates have taken to calling Dion Phaneuf "Pegasus" because of the obnoxious ad in Union Station that claims the "Dion Gives Toronto Wings."

Hi all,

 

Last year, after the Phaneuf and Giguerre trades I started to think about the Leafs' 1991-'92 season. I remembered the Leafs were absolutely horrible that season until Jan 2 1992 when Doug Gilmour and several other players came to The Leafs as part of a blockbuster trade. Almost immediately the Leafs started to improve, win more and play more exciting hockey. Of course by the time Gilmour et. al. had joined the Leafs it was to late for a playoff run, but there was a sense that things at Maple Leaf Gardens were turning around.

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This is actually a serious debate. Everyone tells me that Brian Burke is trying to acquire a playmaking centre for Phil Kessel. They mention names like Brad Richards and Marc Savard, arguing that Kessel needs someone to pass it to him. But does he? Let's see the arguments for that.

Kessel is all alone on the top line really. He is frightened and confused about what to do as opposing defences focus on shutting him down and laughing at the rest of our top line. This is a strategy that has held Kessel to so few goals in the last 20 or so games. If he had a playmaker he would be able to wait for him to open and get him the puck. As it stands, nobody seems to be able to get him the puck because he is always defended heavily (can you blame them?). Also playmakers tend to be excellent players that can score as well so they will draw some defenders.

With all those arguments it seems like a playmaking centre is the biggest issue facing the Leafs. However, Burke has stated over and over again that his primary focus is to find a winger with size to play with Kessel. He has stopped saying that in the last few months so people have forgotten but he has stated this repeatedly in the past. Now what are the arguments for a winger with size?

Wingers with size tend to be big and strong, which may not be much of an argument until you remember how much Brian Burke values truculence. Remember his proper levels of truculence, belligerence, testosterone, and pugnacity statement? I'll give you a minute to watch it again. Now, remember Corey Perry and Ryan Getzlaf? That's right, power forwards were the reasons the Ducks won the Stanley Cup.

I would also like to point out that Burke models his teams after the NY Islanders dynasty. That's right, the joke of the league was once a dynasty. They were famous for having wingers with size. Considering they won four straight Stanley Cups I would love to copy them. Furthermore, the Leafs don't have many wingers with size. Sure we have some on the third and fourth line, but all we have in the top six is Nikolai Kulemin, and we all know how much Burke loves his Europeans.

So in conclusion, I think Burke is targeting wingers with size. I don't blame him because I think it is the absolute right thing to do. That is not to say if  a good player is available Burke will just pass him by, but he will prefer to go after wingers with size.

Continue reading this post »

Okay, okay, okay - I know it's the easy thing to fire the coach. But hear me out on this more reasoned approach.

Wilson has had the team for two full seasons plus this season so far. They are 29th in penalty kill and 21st in PP. Granted, he wasn't dealt the best cards and he may have had success elsewhere but he is having no success with this team. It's not so bad to get fired - one of the biggest reasons coaches get fired is because they can't get traded. For the same reasons some good players have to go for the sake of team chemistry - so too must the coach.

The players don't play for Wilson any more. You can see it in their faces and the mounting frustration. They used to care when Wilson called them out but now they don't - see Phil Kessel's minor outburst when asked how he felt about getting benched last week. The players are playing the way they want to because they know whatever they do - Wilson will criticize them anyway ( why would he criticize them after the comeback from 4-1 against Boston last week?!! Let them have one celebratory night ! ) so Wilson's ability to motivate and guide these players is lost; the Leafs are a team at sea without a rudder.

It's in situations like this that leaders emerge - we all know Dion Phaneuf is the Captain but can he really LEAD this team? The current void in coaching leadership is an excellent time for Phaneuf to really make these Leafs HIS team. Lets hope that this is the rock bottom and a new chemistry is formed in this current morass.

My analysis of 'blue and white disease' is this: players come here and hit the ice amid massive press coverage heralding them as the next saviour  - which forces the player to reach beyond his grasp; try too hard and spin his wheels - Kessel obviously is the best example of this but did the press need to welcome Luca Caputi and Jeff Finger as if Charlie Conacher rose from the grave? The Leafs have always been the team the press makes them to be and the players have never had to deal with reality because Management tries a short term fix. Past management has tried to trade its way out of bad performance but as we all know, this can't happen in the current NHL. All the players are spinning out at the same time now - Phaneuf, Mike Komisarek, Kessel - but as Dave Nonis told them last week - the only answer is in this room.

It won't be easy but a new team will emerge in the coming months, a team coming from the absolute bottom. Count on a trade or two - this season is gone and we will not make the playoffs. But I believe Burke's firm hand will guide them going forward. Forget about the Kessel miscalculation. History is history. Let's move forward.

The Leafs absolutely cannot do any worse with ANY other coach. Get rid of Wilson over the Christmas break and let Acton ride out the season. This will lift a gigantic weight off the team and give them a spark and hope in 2011. 

And give the fans hope too.

It seems like we get dragged down in a lot of talk about how important lottery picks and ELCs are, but I think we mostly agree that it's pretty difficult to plan around those.  So I decided to look at something that you can plan around - drafting.  How important has drafting and internally developing players been to the Stanley Cup champions since the lockout?  Maybe someone has made a post like this before, I haven't been here long so I'm not sure, but I think this is interesting info anyway.

I only wanted to look at key players, but I wanted to do this as objectively as possible.  Since playoff performances are ultimately what wins championships, I'm going to do this based on playoff rather than regular season stats.  I'm going to rank the top 6 forwards by playoff points, the top 4 defenceman by playoff minutes-per-game, and the top goalie based on wins.  This may seem like it ignores the role of the checking forward, but when you see these lists you'll notice that checking line players actually appear for multiple teams (which also proves how important depth is in case your top players get shut down by opposing teams).

I've listed the way each player was acquired - through the Draft, as a Free Agent, through a Trade, or as an Undrafted Free Agent.  Personally I would consider an Undrafted Free Agent to be the equivalent of a draft pick in that they were picked up by the team's scouting staff and developed internally, but I've listed them seperately for the sake of accuracy.

* * *

 

2010 Chicago Blackhawks

 

Forwards

1. Jonathan Toews - Draft

2. Patrick Kane - Draft

3. Patrick Sharp - Trade

4. Dave Bolland - Draft

5. Marian Hossa - Free Agent

6. Kris Versteeg - Trade

 

Defence

1. Duncan Keith - Draft

2. Brent Seabrook - Draft

3. Niklas Hjalmarsson - Draft

4. Brian Campbell - Free Agent

 

Goalie

1. Anti Niemi - Undrafted Free Agent

 

* * *

 

2009 Pittsburgh Penguins

 

Forwards

1. Evgeni Malkin - Draft

2. Sidney Crosby - Draft

3. Bill Guerin - Trade

4. Ruslan Fedotenko - Free Agent

5. Chris Kunitz - Trade

6. Maxime Talbot - Draft

 

Defence

1. Sergei Gonchar - Free Agent

2. Rob Scuderi - Draft

3. Brooks Oprik - Draft

4. Hal Gill - Trade

 

Goalie

1. Marc-Andre Fleury - Draft

 

* * *

 

2008 Detroit Red Wings

 

Forwards

1. Henrik Zetterberg - Draft

2. Pavel Datsyuk - Draft

3. Johan Franzen - Draft

4. Jiri Hudler - Draft

5. Mikael Samuelsson - Free Agent

6. Tomas Holmstrom - Draft

 

In fact, if you go down the Wings' depth chart that year, virtually their entire forward corps was drafted and developed internally. People aren't exaggerating when they say the Wings have great player development.

 

Defence

1. Nicklas Lidstrom - Draft

2. Brian Rafalski - Free Agent

3. Niklas Kronwall - Draft

4. Brad Stuart - Trade

 

Goalie

1. Chris Osgood - Free Agent, though originally a Detroit draft pick

 

* * *

 

2007 Anaheim Ducks

 

Forwards

1. Ryan Getzlaf - Draft

2. Corey Perry - Draft

3. Teemu Selanne - Free Agent (Trade earlier in career)

4. Andy McDonald - Undrafted Free Agent

5. Travis Moen - Trade

6. Samuel Pahlsson - Trade

 

Defence

1. Francois Beauchemin - Trade

2. Chris Pronger - Trade

3. Scott Niedermayer - Free Agent

4. Sean O'Donnell - Trade

 

No, that's not a misprint, Beauchemin played more minutes than Pronger or Niedermayer the playoff year that Anaheim won the Cup.

 

Goalie

1. J.S. Giguere - Trade

 

* * *

 

2006 Carolina Hurricanes

 

Forwards

1. Eric Staal - Draft

2. Cory Stillman - Free Agent

3. Rod Brind'Amour - Trade

4. Justin Williams - Trade

5. Matt Cullen - Free Agent

6. Mark Recchi - Trade

 

Defence

1. Bret Hedican - Trade

2. Aaron Ward - Trade

3. Mike Commodore - Trade

4. Frantisek Kaberle - Free Agent

 

Goalie

1. Cam Ward - Draft

 

* * *

 

OK, so with that information listed, what conclusions can we draw?  I actually think the results here are less clear than I was expecting.  I thought that the results would show that drafting was the only way to build a successful team, but it turns out that it's not.  While the past 3 Cup winners have all been based heavily on draft picks, the 2 champs prior to that were built largely through trades and free agents.

 

One interesting point is that, while most people argue that the 2007 Ducks are the best example of what the Leafs are trying to do, I'd argue that the 2006 Carolina Hurricans are probably a better example.  The Ducks were lead by Getzlaf and Perry, and the Leafs haven't drafted any players of that quality for a while.  Going into the playoffs in 2006 only one prominent player on the Hurricanes - Eric Staal - was developed internally.  Cam Ward became the second one when he took over the starting job from Gerber.  The team was almost entirely put together by GM Jim Rutherford based on some savvy trades and a couple of key free agent signings; this is actually the model the Leafs are following at the moment.

 

One interesting thing to note is that all 5 teams had their leading scorer as someone they drafted.  In fact, aside from the Flyers last year, this is true of the Stanley Cup finalist who loses as well.  That means 9/10 Stanley Cup finalists since the lockout have been lead in scoring by a player drafted and developed internally.

 

One other point I'd note is that it looks like drafting goalies is not nearly as important as drafting well at other positions.  3 of the past 5 Stanley Cup winners have won with goalies they gained through means other than drafting.

 

So, what do you think after looking at this information?