Hockey Purist Nightmare

Team: 2023-24 Toronto Maple Leafs

Initial Creation Date: May 21, 2023

Published: May 22, 2023

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

TL;DR at the bottom if you're just here for a quick look.

What else to piss off a hockey purist's but to have your top line being all American players. With all the hate that the conference finals are getting for being all southern teams, this would get all the 35+ year old Toronto fans furious having 2 Arizonians on the top line, with a 3rd American to round it out (also, with robo being from California, that makes half of the top 6 forwards from the southern US).

Moving to the actual team, the main difference maker is really how much Kane and O'Reilly are offered in FA. I personally believe that Kane can land up to 7 mil and O'Reilly 6.5 mil. If these players both are looking for largest offer, we might have to just offer Kane the asking price and find a new 3C under 5 mil, but if they both want to a team who has a chance to win and are willing to take the pay cuts, landing both is game changing. Kane-Matthews will be nasty, and O'Reilly as a 3C is an incredible luxury.

Another big move is the Nylander for Weeger deal. With a change to the core 4 being all but inevitable, I think Nylander is both the easiest to move due to his slightly smaller contract (comparatively), and is likely the most expendable after his playoff performance (it sounds harsh, but it's the best word to describe it). Kane will replace his offensive production, and his lack of defensive contributions.

The Leafs defense wasn't the problem this year, but that doesn't mean it didn't have any soft spots, with Brodie playing some of his best and worst games these playoff, and generally just being very polarizing for the worst, I lost faith in him being that solid, consistent presence from the blue line, and we shouldn't be paying him 5 mil if he can't be that guy. Sure, he wasn't the worst defenseman we had, he had some great games, but if I had to choose between him and Weeger in the top 4, Brods isn't winning my vote.

The final points to mention is depth concerns and goalies. Starting with the former, the bottom D pair is... pliable(?), depending on how much of a pay cut the the forwards take, it changes the bottom pair a bit. I was looking at Ferraro for prospects (Voit or Hirvonen+), but without drastic pay cuts, I couldn't get the money to work, so I went with adding a bit more to the Murray dump to land Moser as the return instead of a pick, this way, if Gio has another season in him, whichever of Moser or Timmins can play right side, and if Gio falls to 7th D, Moser-Timmins could work too. Forward depth is really just trying to give both lines some identity. The 4th line is defensively reliable, with Jarnkrok being able to jump around the lineup if necessary, and the 3rd line is a sandpaper line, with guys like McMann and Acciari being physical forecheckers that are massive annoyances for opposing defenses, whittling them down throughout the game.

Goalies are pretty simple. I want a full season with Woll backing up, and dumping Murray for a Sammy extension 4x4 feels like a natural move. Best case, Woll plays 1b caliber all season and Sammy continues to look like a starter. Worst case (barring injury), Woll isn't ready for the NHL (which is unlikely with what he's shown) and Sammy regresses (which is a bit more possible, but I wouldn't bet on it).

TL;DR, Nylander and Brodie moved for Weeger and Kane, O'Reilly and Kane join if they want win and are ok not taking largest offer available, Forward depth has identity, defensive depth is a game of f*** around and find out, and goalies just need to play at a .900+ and they're fine.

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