Toronto Maple Leafs Officially Welcome Matt Murray to Pressure Cooker

The Toronto Maple Leafs begin the year with two new goalies and an absolute ton of optimism.

The Toronto Maple Leafs have the reining Hart Trophy winner, and Auston Matthews won’t be recovering from a wrist injury to start this season, so hopes of 70+ goals are not that unrealistic. 

Additionally, the Leafs have a second line that is as good as most any team’s first line, they have the best defensive line (once the lineup is sorted out) and a solid cast of fourth line depth.

On top of that, they have seven top-four blue-liners (their “worst” defenseman is Justin Holl, who has skated in the top-four of the fourth best team over the last 2 seasons) as well as a minimum of three up-and-coming stars who will be playing out the year on very cheap contracts (Robertson, Liljegren, and Sandin) even if only one of those guys will be in tonight’s lineup.

Did I mention that on top of Matthews, the Leafs have Mitch Marner, the NHL’s best player from January of last year to the end of the season.  Marner came back from injury and scored at a pace that would beat Connor McDavid’s career high in points, and a 53 goal pace, and he did it while posting some of the best defensive metrics in the league.

If you don’t have Mitch Marner down as the NHL’s fourth best player, you are wrong.

Moving on.

Toronto Maple Leafs vs Montreal Canadiens

The Leafs are likely to be the best team in the NHL this year.

If they do not win the Stanley Cup, the season will be a disappointment.

But we aren’t in the Hagar Years yet, and so hold onto your butts cause this is the year….

Which I say every year…..and which I always believe.

Because, let’s be honest, this team could have already won several cups by now.

As for Montreal….they will be looking to secure a second-straight 1st overall pick.

This game shouldn’t be close. The Canadiens have precious few players who could even make the Leafs, but in game one you never know what could happen.

Speaking of which:

Matt Murray is the Leafs new goalie. I don’t know what to make of that. The guy has 2 Stanley Cups. By the logic of my internet foes, that makes him twice as good as Nazem Kadri, who is now supposedly better than John Tavares (despite a 400 point deficit and being the worse player in 12 out of 13 seasons) due to having recently won a Stanley Cup.

I just say what I hear, I can’t make sense of it either. I am psyched though, the Leafs never disappoint, and they never let you down. I have complete faith in them.  Maybe not George Michael levels faith, but definitely at a Bizkit level.

I have the most medium confidence in the boys this year, but that’s more confidence than I have in boats (I’m a 2 x lifejacket kind of guy) so place your bets accordingly.

Go Leafs!