Opinion | Leafs mailbag: Buy out Tavares? Trade Matthews? Game 7 sure did strike a nerve

If you are looking for the difference between the Maple Leafs and Lightning — that thin line between winning and losing — look no further than goaltending.

Andrei Vasilevskiy was better than Jack Campbell.

It might not look that way from a cursory glance at their numbers. The Leafs, after all, scored 13 times on Vasilevskiy in five-on-five situations; the Lightning scored 12 times on Campbell. The Leafs scored 22 times overall on Vasilevskiy; the Lightning got 21 by Campbell. Their save percentages were identical (.897).

So how was Vasilevskiy better? It comes down to high-danger scoring chances — those shots where you wonder how the goalie stopped it. Vasilevskiy did it more often.

At all strengths, both goalies faced 57 high-danger chances, according to naturalstattrick.com.

Vasilevskiy stopped 51 of them for an .895 high-danger save percentage. Campbell stopped 48 (.842 HDSV%), a three-goal swing for Tampa.

The contrast becomes starker when isolating the final two games. The Leafs managed 15 high-dangers shots on Vasilevskiy. He stopped 14 (.933 HDSV%).

The Lightning managed 18 high-danger shots on Campbell. He stopped 14 (.773 HDSV%). Again, that three-goal swing.

Tampa won each of the final two games by a single goal.

Good times

It was a great year to cover the Leafs, even if it ended too soon. I appreciate the questions and the feedback, even if we don’t always agree. I love that you come to me.

As always, if you have a question email me at [email protected] and I’ll answer it in the next Mailbag. Because, you know, it’s never too soon to start the 2022-23 season. The Leafs actually have a first-round pick, and I kind of think there will be one significant, surprising move.

To this Mailbag

Yes, Leafs fans are taking another first-round loss remarkably well. All they want to do is buy out John Tavares, trade Auston Matthews. So here’s an Emergency Monday Mailbag, to walk all of you back from the edge.

QUESTION: Hi, Kevin. In the third period of Game 7, when the Leafs were behind 2-1, Tampa Bay was able to clog up the shooting area in front of their net every time the Leafs were in the Bolts’ end. As the clock ticked down on the Leafs’ season, every potentially available space for a shot seemed to have a white shirt in it.

What’s the answer for this? Different coaching? Different players?

Thanks for your great coverage of the Leafs this season.

Best, Mike in Jersey

ANSWER: A different coach in Tampa, one who doesn’t preach defence, is the answer. Selfless defending is what the Lightning are so good at. The key vs. the Lightning is to be ahead early. They’re the best team in the NHL at locking down in the third period. That was the uphill battle the Leafs faced.

QUESTION: Hi, Kevin. Do you think the loss of Game 7 vs. Tampa rests on Sheldon Keefe?

So when you look at the statistics in this series, our power play let us down. That’s on Keefe! The failure to do something different, that your opponent is not expecting was needed.

What good was the Tavares factor? Why is he on the PP? To win faceoffs? What does JT91 do while the puck is being circulated at the point. JT91 is our big-body physical presence in front of the net? Please! It’s tough physical playoff hockey, you need tough physical players to wreak havoc in front of the net on a PP, where PK is doing everything to block shots. That’s why I asked you about the Marlies’ Curtis Douglas!

The Achilles heel of the Leafs is the PP kept doing what worked in regular season, duh! Your opponent scouts you and comes up with strategies to nullify what worked during the regular season.

Heck, forget about winning every faceoff. Put Muzzin in front of the net while Marner, Matthews, Rielly and Nylander circulate the puck looking for an opening. Muzzin’s physical net presence changes the dynamic of the Leaf PP. The definition of insanity is keep doing the same thing, and expecting different results.

Dubas’ penchant to acquire midgets, when you need giants to win playoff games, showed us that Dubas just doesn’t get.

So, I rest my case on the wisdom of buying out JT91’s contract, $11 million that could be spent on players who can be difference makers. Is JT91 a difference maker? Let’s take a look at other team captains. There are many that I would rather have than JT91. As I have written to you all year, the Leafs will never win a cup with JT91 as captain. Time to give the C to Austin Matthews and sign him to an extension.

Use that $11 million to make the changes that will win in the playoffs. Other GMs get it, time for Dubas, or his replacement, to get it too!

Sadly MLSE really does not care if the Leafs win or not. They are making boatloads of cash on a new crop of gullible Leafs fans who continue to support a losing product.

As a season ticket-holder and diehard fan since 1962, only Cliff Fletcher read the tea leaves correctly and had a team with Clark and Gilmour.

Fletcher traded Clark for Sundin.

JT91 never reminds me of Clark, Gilmour or Sundin.

When we lost with Clark, Gilmour or Sundin, we knew those players gave everything to win, because they had something JT91 will never have, that killer instinct alpha-dog determination to get it done! We long-suffering Leafs fans deserve players that have that alpha-dog killer instinct.

Kyle Dubas should be replaced with someone who can bring us these type of players!

Go Leafs Go!

Dan W., London Ont.

ANSWER: You ask about Keefe, but you want to blame Tavares. Look, Tavares had three goals and three assists in seven games and had a (perfectly good in my mind) goal called back in Game 7. Tavares is a beast in front of the opposition net. His game is 10 feet from the crease and in. He takes a beating. If the rest of the team chooses to pass endlessly on the power play around the perimeter, then they’re not doing their job trying to get the puck to the net, where Tavares can do his work.

Few players are as good in close as Tavares. (Matthews is, but that shot of his needs to be on the wing.) The power play puzzled me because they stopped doing what they were good at, which was continual motion. For some reason, Marner and Matthews remained static on the half-boards, making them predictable, slowing down the play and making it easier for the Lightning to defend.

As for buying out Tavares — an absurd notion on its surface — it would be foolish from a cap perspective. His money is mostly in signing bonuses, which cannot be bought out and would still count against the cap. In a buyout scenario, his cap hit would drop from $11 million to $10,393,333, a savings of $606,667. You can’t get a player for that amount.

By the way, how many Stanley Cups won with all those other captains you mentioned?

QUESTION: Hey, Kevin. So they lost again, and of course there are reasons: It was Tampa, the refs were incompetent, we took ’em to seven games, part of the team’s development ad infinitum. They lost. Again. This group just can’t get it done. Great teams rise to the occasion; this team doesn’t. And how happy do you think Zach Hyman is this morning? He made it to the second round of the playoffs!

So what to do? The best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour. So time to change the team’s core. So now I, as a minister, enter the land of heresy: Trade Auston Matthews.

I know, I know. But his value is off the charts right now and they could get a huge return. Hey, the Oilers traded Gretzky.

I just don’t believe in Matthews as a leader, since the incident with the woman in a car a couple of years back. Not only did he do it, but failed to tell his team until they found out. It’s a character thing. Yes, we all make mistakes. But Kevin, I’m betting you didn’t terrorize a frightened woman at that age, nor did I.

Anyway, just my thoughts. Didn’t watch a game this season until dipping into the playoffs. Didn’t miss it and my stress level decreased significantly!

Anyway, hope you are well and now get a break.

And how about the Jays?

All the best, Christopher W.

ANSWER: Hey, Dan W. above thinks Matthews should be the captain, so there’s obviously an “eye of the beholder” thing going on. By the way, the woman (a war veteran working as a condo security guard) was never “terrorized” as you put it. She reported the incident to the condo board and simply wanted an apology. The Matthews camp accused her of making it up. Her integrity wrongly questioned, she went to the police. That’s when it blew up. Matthews eventually apologized. I’m not excusing poor behaviour on Matthews’s end, nor those close to him who hoped to sweep it under the carpet. Just trying to set record straight.

QUESTION: Hi, Kevin. The final result for the Leafs always seemed inevitable to me. They should have found inspiration in the opportunity to thwart your prediction.

Aside from the refereeing fiascos, the inability of the Leafs’ power play to deliver in heavy going seems problematic. Do the Leafs need a different type of scorer, a big-body, net-front guy or something else? On a related point, why haven’t any Leafs shown up as the sleeper hero, like Nick Paul or Max Domi this year?

Thanks for another great year of the mailbag.

Greg in Peterborough

ANSWER: Good point. The Leafs’ secondary players didn’t exactly break through and make names for themselves. I thought Pierre Engvall might have been the Paul or Domi. Still, it’s not on them that the Leafs lost. But yes, the playoffs are built for players like them to be heroes.

QUESTION: Hi, Kevin. I actually don’t feel completely disappointed about the Leafs being eliminated.

OK, I’ll readily admit a win would have been better, but it’s not like we saw them lose four games to nothing, or that they had a stranglehold on Tampa and we watched them come back to take the series.

It’s not like 2021, where they were expected to trounce Montreal and then let them win three games in a row to win the best-of-seven.

Separated by only a few points, Tampa and Toronto were pretty much equals, minus the Tampa battle-hardened experience of winning the Stanley Cup the past two years.

A Stanley Cup contender had to lose, and unfortunately once again it was Toronto.

Todd C.

ANSWER: You mean you’re not despondent and wanting to blow it all up? What kind of Leafs fan are you?

QUESTION: I’m wondering how they can navigate the cap.

Aside from the core, Pierre Engvall has to stick around. David Kämpf has been excellent, and Ilya Mikheyev has flagged a bit in scoring but still works the defensive side of the game.

After some promise, it seems readily apparent that Wayne Simmonds and Kyle Clifford are done playing effective hockey. Jason Spezza has done everything asked of him.

Do we keep Ilya Lyubushkin? What happens with Rasmus Sandin? I’m not a fan of Justin Holl as he seems easy to skate around. What do you think?

Thanks as always.

Peter C., back in Noo Yawk

ANSWER: Great questions, answers to come. Kämpf has one year left on his contract. Engvall, Sandin and Timothy Liljegren are RFAs so the Leafs have some control on their contracts, and they should be back. I imagine Sandin-Liljegren start off as the third pair. Simmonds and Clifford are signed for next season, though their contracts can be buried in the minors if it comes to that. I imagine Spezza retires. Mikheyev is a UFA, and I imagine some other team will make a play for him that the Leafs can’t (or won’t) match. (He has no goals other than empty-netters in 19 career playoff games.) If they keep Lyubushkin and deem Holl will be no better than their seventh defenceman, I imagine he’ll be traded. The $2 million in cap space is more valuable.

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