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Leafs Will NOT Make Playoffs in 2006-07 |
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EDIT : To appease some of the readers, I am editing this post to preface the fact that I too am a diehard Leafs fan. : END-EDIT
As much as I respect Howard Berger and wish I had his job, I'm going to disagree with his assessment of the Maple Leafs for this coming season.
While he is correct in assuming that the Leafs are a better team than last year, one that will not be fun to play against, it won't be enough to propel this team into the playoffs. Here's why.
1 - Last year's Leafs team produced results vastly out-pacing the quality of the roster. In other words, they were huge overachievers.
2 - The offense was very weak, and ony got worse with the apparent loss of Jason Allison. Slow as he may be, Allison provided a significant jolt to the offense. In order to overcome this, the Leafs will need to see monumental leaps in the achievements of it's young nucleus of forwards. That means career bests for Alex Steen, Kyle Wellwood, Matt Stajan, Alexei Ponikarovsky, John Pohl, and Nikolai Antropov. They will need a solid bounce back year from Mike Peca. They will need Mats Sundin to produce at the clip he did over the last month of the regular season. They will need Jeff O'Neill to rediscover his snipers touch. They will need at least one significant surprise scorer, Aleksander Suglobov seems most likely at this point. That's a lot of needs, and not much to suggest that they will all come true.
3 - Andrew Raycroft will have to play like he did in his Calder winning season. While this is not a stretch of the imagination, by any means, it isn't very likely. It also isn't likely that he repeats last season's dismal performance. I predict results that fall somewhere in between 2003-04 and 2005-06. That's to say, I don't think he'll win any awards or garner much all-star attention, but I also don't think he'll lose the starter's job to a career backup from the minor leagues.
4 - While most teams load up on talented, puck moving defenders, the Leafs brought in two behemoths. The Flyers tried this strategy last season and were largely ridiculed, investing in Derian Hatcher, Mike Rathje, and Chris Therien. Kubina is a first-rate defender, he was the #1 defenseman (minute-wise) on a Stanley Cup champion. He will be well worth the acquisition. Adding Hal Gill remains a mystery to me, as the Leafs possess a sextuplet of possible future NHL caliber defensemen, most of whom seen at least some action last season. I'd have prefered to see 3 of Colaiacovo, Bell, Harrison, Wozniewsky, Kronwall, and White adorn the jersey on a regular basis.
5 - The grand vision of the new CBA is to create parity throughout the league. To do that, you need a redistribution of talent. To that end, the top teams in the East (Ottawa, Carolina, Buffalo) have lost, or will lose, significant pieces to their respective puzzles. Teams at the bottom have added these pieces, and as such the race will be much closer. While New Jersey, Tampa, and Montreal are perhaps primed to fall out of the playoffs, I expect marked improvements from Atlanta, Boston, Pittsburgh, Florida and pretty much every team that missed the playoffs (notable exception and vicious potshot - New York Islanders). With the exploits of the Sabres, Hurricanes, and Rangers fresh on our minds, I find it hard to discount any team at this point, even the lowly Capitals.
6 - The Leafs are still in a very tough division, that is only getting tougher. With 32 of their 82 games against division rivals, that's a lot of games for the Leafs to play against some quality opposition. Ottawa manhandled the Leafs last season. Buffalo is a very solid team. Boston will be much more difficult to play against, and probably better as a whole, with the additions of Marc Savard and Zdeno Chara. Montreal may be primed for a slight drop, as I tend to believe they also overachieved. Should Christobal Huet offer a repeat performance, however, the Canadiens will quickly make a liar out of me.
All in all, I am cautiously optimistic about this year's Leafs team. I believe they are better than last season. I also believe that the quality of the field has improved, on average. That will make it more difficult to qualify for the postseason.
Barring any major player acquisitions, I don't foresee this year's editions of the Leafs qualifying for the playoffs.
That being said, I've been fantasically wrong before. Those of you who remain long-time readers may faintly recall my Stanley Cup final preditions, made in the sweltering heat of August, 2005.
I pitted the Vancouver Canucks (who missed the playoffs), against the Florida Panthers (who missed the playoffs). Carolina and Edmonton? Ya, I had them missing the dance altogether.
Keep it clean in the comments folks.
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