Photo credit: Dan Hamilton-Imagn Images
The Toronto Maple Leafs’ best chance at success this year may hinge on them going all-out and stacking the deck in the hopes of trying to replace Mitch Marner.There has been a ton of talk this summer about how the Toronto Maple Leafs are going to replace the offense lost by Mitch Marner, as it’s going to be pretty hard to replicate a 100-point player who was such a catalyst for their success last season.It’ll be up to Auston Matthews and company to carry the slack, and though the new additions have the chance to bring offensive production, it pales in comparison to Marner so they need to figure out something (until a trade comes along).
Which means it might not be the worst idea for Craig Berube to go for broke and play to his strengths, mainly his bevy of superstars.
Toronto Must Lean on Their Star Power to Stay Ahead
No clue how to slot some Fs I’m about to not list, but you could get to something like this:
Knies – Matthews – Nylander
Maccelli – Tavares – McMann
Laughton (some C reps) – Roy – Joshua
Not overly high on McMann there post-deadline, he’s streaky, but he’s logical there for now.
They then followed it up wit the fact that the Nylander/Tavares experiment hasn’t been fantastic, and Tavares works better with complimentary pieces:
It stems from the fact that whoever plays with Knies-Matthews will play against the best a lot & Tavares-Nylander has been an odd fit.
You can just stack, have Tavares be the guy (he’s used to it, and his wingers are complimentary & not even bad), & have a solid L3 in place.
It’s not a bad idea considering that Matthews is definitely a good enough playmaker to have Nylander on his wing, and Knies up front is gonna do his thing. We know how good Tavares can be with some lesser names, and doesn’t need Nylander in order to succeed.
If Maccelli and McMann join him it gives Tavares another playmaker and a 20-goal scorer who has the potential to be a 25+ goal scorer should he get his consistency figured out.
That would give Toronto the ability to have Nylander and Matthews at 50+ goals each, with Tavares able to hold down the fort and find some creativity with Maccelli while McMann can drive the net and give him a power forward with skill.
The Risk and Reward of Stacking the Deck in Toronto
Although it does sound like a good idea for the Maple Leafs to put everyone up front and allow them to produce just leaves them back to where they were before. They had a stacked top line and a lack of depth; now there has been a changing of the guard with the bottom-six, but it does need work.
Max Domi and Nick Robertson are streakier than dollar store window cleaner, Dakota Joshua needs to find his footing first, and the rest of the pieces are more gritty and physical; not necessarily offensive.
If you give Domi a chance up top with Matthews where they have chemistry in the past, it allows for a more balanced attack with Robertson or McMann able to play with Nic Roy; and Maccelli can firmly be the second-line winger.
If you put everyone together and it fails, you’ve wasted time and potential chemistry for the sake of some quick goals, which doesn’t really seem like the MO for Craig Berube.
So unless he has a complete turnabout face, it’ll be hard to see Toronto stacking the deck, but if push comes to shove?
They may beef up in order to push back.
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Maple Leafs’ Best Path to Success Could Mean Going Top-Heavy
Do the Maple Leafs need to stack the top line?