The Toronto Maple Leafs look like a team that is out of ideas and doesn't know where to go next.
The Toronto Maple Leafs have pretty much failed in free-agency, setting themselves up to win the Atlantic and Compete for the Stanley Cup as long as:
Joseph Woll remains healthy for the first time in his career, a 31 year-old back-up can succeed playing more games that he has ever before, Mitch Marner has a career year playing for a contract, Matthews and Nylander don't regress, Chris Tanev stays healthy and doesn't decline, while both Morgan Rielly and John Tavares avoid falling off an age-related cliff.
As long as all that happens, the Leafs can, maybe be a contender.
The Toronto Maple Leafs Seem Like a Team Wasting Time Until Everyone Is Fired
The Leafs came into the summer with a clear mandate: Make Big Changes.
They had to either trade Marner or convince their fans he was part of the solution. They chose to just stick their head in the sand, say nothing, and let the situation fester. Basically the worst possible option.
At the draft, instead of trying to hit home-runs, they seemed more concerned with being able to say they eventually drafted an NHL Player. First round pick Ben Danford is a fine pick, but first round picks should at least have star potential, and he doesn't.
The Leafs needed a top goalie, a top defenseman and a third-line centre. They instead completely failed at getting the goalie, and the centre, while their so-called top-defeneman was a crazy bet that has an extremely low probability of working out.
You can make an argument that they are boxed in, don't have many assets or much cap space, but honestly that's B.S. The Leafs are only boxed in by their absolutely embarrassing tolerance for risk and their complete lack of creativity or outside-the-box thinking.
It was obvious after a worst-case-scenario year that Treliving was not a very good GM, but instead of cleaning house like he should have, incoming MLSE President Keith Pelley decided to give Shanahan and Co. one more year.
They don't seem to know what to do with it. They clearly want to be somewhat responsible but they also know if they don't at least make the Final Four next year, they are all out of jobs.
So what you get is this ridiculous hybrid of trying to be all-in, but not quite. They are a team that was employing a studs and duds cap philosophy that is no longer doing that with the new contracts they sign, but hasn't changed the personnel.
Let me break it down for anyone in the this organization that might be reading: You either have to go all in, which means you trade Cowan and make a decision on Marner, then dump the dead-weight and actually make this team into a team that might actually win next year's Stanley Cup, or you just do what you've been doing for the last week and flip a coin to see if you make the playoffs.
The Leafs off-season is going horribly. Barring an incredible .180 this is a team that has no real plan and whose management is just biding time until they're all dumped next April.