This late season surge leaves a mixed bag of emotions in my head as I watch the young Maple Leafs work passionately to start their National Hockey League careers off the right way, winning.
The speed, creativity and overall smarts the young players have these days is nothing shy of amazing. You can see the determination and fire in the eyes of these young impactful players. All those morning bag skates are paying off as they get their chance to shine in the NHL, the league they have been working so hard to get to all these years. How can we as fans expect these players to roll over accept defeat and stick with the fans plans to end with the best lottery position for this year’s 2016 Draft. We can’t, but it doesn’t mean a part of us feels there are going to be some negative side-effects to all this late season winning.
Look on the bright side, always look on the bright side…The young players are the ones making the impact, perhaps changing the fortunes of our draft pick for the better or worse. It’s up to the ping pong balls come lottery time anyhow, which is completely out of our hands and the players hands. Right now it’s about moving forward, staying patient and progressing as a club. If that means the Leafs pass three teams down the final stretch here and end up 27th instead of 30th, so be it. We could still end up winning the lottery, or we could end up with a worse pick, either which way, a great player will be selected, and we have a number of other picks for Hunter to pluck a few gems.
With the vast number of picks the Leafs have obtained through trade and keeping their own, I feel there is a very good chance you see Toronto use some of those picks to their advantage and move up in the draft, whether it be round one or two, if they see a player they are high on and can’t risk losing him to another team. Now’s the time, this year’s draft is strong with a number of quality prospects. The Leafs have invested a lot of time and money removing and adding a new and improved scouting staff as well as a management staff. The guns are a blazing from the top of the Toronto Maple Leafs food chain and smoke will soon to follow as Toronto continues to add quality picks and prospects to the organization.
How many players are rumoured to be possibilities to the Leafs in this year’s off season? Stamkos, Vesey, Zaitsev, Radulov and I’m sure many more that I missed or will come to follow as we approach this year’s draft.
Babcock said at the start of the season there will be pain, but he also said when it’s safe they will come; which was meant for incoming free agents down the road. Mike Babcock’s statement speaks volumes to me, this shows he knows what Toronto is now, what it was in the glory years and of course what it’s been for too many years to count; disappointing. When the environment is safe in Leafs Nation, the birds will flock to the promise land, that’s what I see out of Babcock’s words.
Kadri
Nazem “the dream… Kadri burries a hat trick to keep the Florida Panthers out of first place in the Atlantic. The Leafs may have lost versus Tampa the night before, but they really stuck it to the Panthers last night gobbling them up with a 5-2 win. Maple Leafs Kadri scored two of his three goals in the second period and finished the hat trick in the third period scoring his 17th goal of the season. Kadri also leads the Leafs with 44 points in 74 games. Don’t let his 17 goals fool you, Kadri is only shooting at a 6.7% and that’s quite low for his skill set and average around the league. He’s had quite the matchups all season long, going against other teams top lines, pairing off against players like Tavares and Bergeron.
This would be Babcock giving Kadri confidence and a shot to prove his worth as a number one center, or even being the clubs solid number two down the middle for years to come, which is nothing to hang your head about. Kadri is a 50+ point player, and he will continue to produce at this rate for time to come, but be serious, love or hate the kid. He brings a lot more to the table than just points. His faceoffs have improved, but there is something Kadri has that the Leafs need. He has a fierce side to his game, causing opponents to get easily frusterated, which in turn helps him draw more and more penalties. Once this Maple Leafs team get’s itself on track and the quality prospects ripen to NHL studs, the numbers will only improve for Kadri who has paid his dues in the Leafs organization.
Kadri has a whopping 253 shots on net and has continued to improve on his two-way game. Don’t let his -14 rating fool you, the Leafs were horrendous for a large chunk of the season, and injuries to Bozak, Lupul, Komarov, JVR and other teammates didn’t help his cause.
Personally I think it’s silly to think the Leafs would trade their most skilled NHL center, at least with Shanahan running the show. I’m more concerned about whether or not the Leafs ink Kadri to a long-term deal or a shorter one as perhaps Babcock and Lou want to see how Nylander develops. Either which way, I’d be absolutely shocked if Toronto and Kadri don’t come up with a deal that works for both.
Toronto will play Buffalo, Detroit, Florida, Columbus, Philadelphia and New Jersey for their last six games of the 2016 season, enjoy them, and don’t stress about the lottery.
Thanks for reading.