Stamkos, Tavares, Matthews as C core.. oh my.. Gourde and Johnson can be used to get RHD. Deal.

Its stupid for Tampa.. sometimes you lose sometimes you win. Its not Cooper or Stamkos' mistake that team hasnt showed up..

Not the coaches and captain fault when a team has worst failire in NHL History? .. 5 years with mostly same team? .. wow

Very prophetic term used in business but applies in life ... winners win and losers lose .. learn it

So in order to win the cup, tampa brings in a bunch of former rangers that couldn't win the cup.. hmmm.. i feel like this was to be expected.

This is ridiculous. Want to know what happened? Tampa was due for a slump. Hedman was hurt and your D core is way thinner than any Tampa fan wants to admit.

You look like an asshole when you try to ship out your captain who turned down more money to come play in his home town to sign a friendly deal in Tampa.

Shhhh! Let them trade away their best players - all the better for us!

STAMKOS IS A BUM! HE'S NOT WORTH A BAG OF PUCKS!

Yeah, trade a franchise player. That'll make you get better... LOL

Stamkos played injured. He's an was injured. Kucherov made a dumbass mistake and had a dirty hit.. shoulda got more than 1 game. That's not Cooper'a fault. That's not Stamko's fault. They had one of the best regular seasons in NHL history and you wanna just blow it up instantly? LOL.. chill dude.

Amazing how for folks wanting to be GMs know nothing on winning:

1. Team has been mostly together for 5 years ... since a Cup loss to Chicago .. team has REGRESSED since then ..
2. You can build a team for playoffs or for regular season .. Tampas goal was regular season .. that on leadership and doing nothing at trade deadline is yet another indicator the franchise has issues
3. Stamkos was a MINUS 8 in 4 games sweep . Think about that and tell me decline isnt accelerating.. again playoffs ONLY thing that matters

I could go on but ask yourself as a GM .. not a sheep minion fan .. what would you do?

So let me get this straight: the true fans are people that throw their franchise players under the bus because they couldn't play at maximum level due to injury and "sheep and minion" fans are people that accept facts as they are and don't blame single assets for the loss of the whole team?

You're a bad example of everything that's wrong in any team's fanbase, you absolute f***ing prick.

LOL.. a few things here.

1. No one is trying to be a GM here, this is a fantasy site where people of all ages can post their opinions. They're not trying to be a NHL GM and if you are that's just funny.

2. You thinking that you're smarter than everyone for trading a franchise player is hilarious. Then you say that other people know nothing in winning LOL

3. Regressed? Sorry I didn't know that in 2015 Tampa had more than 62 wins. Didn't know that Kucherov had more than 128 points and was a MVP candidate. Or that Brayden Point has more than 92 points and 40+ goals. Or that Andrei Vasilevskiy was a vezina candidate.

LOL I'm pretty sure you know nothing about winning bud.

Hilarious .. morons here still pointing our regular season stats .. you would fit perfect as Tampa fans ..

So a NHL team should never take a NON EMOTIONAL view of their "franchise player" .. just accept them and who cares on winning?

Winners win and losers lose

Bruh move these franchise players and you won't even get to the playoffs you fool.

That is huge assumption.. depends on players or picks you get .. and there is a phrase called "addition by subtraction" and team chemistry and leadership and etc...

Your anger seems misdirected. Maybe your 128pt regular season guy keeping his cool and a coach that maybe sits Hedman heading into the playoffs, or gets his team ready in general.

Also - Ryan McDonagh is terrible. Very overrated. would have been better off extending Stralman for less money

GOOD POST .. Cooper is primary issue .. but just got extended right before playoffs!!!! .. how telling is that? .. but Stamkos is captain and never delivers in playoffs.. but agree with you else.. finally a rationale poster

Bring me all the stamkos to toronto takes.

For someone who talks about how “90% of Tampa fans” are fair-weather, you’re being a real baby about all of this

You’re trading the core of a team that struggles getting past the 3rd round for (worse) core players who struggle to get past the first round?

Just looking at Stamkos' playoff scoring going back to junior, and this statement appears to be true.

STAMKOS NEVER BEEN A WINNER.. time for leadership change .. trade 2 to 3 SHRIMPS with Stamkos and for veteran playoff winners .. need to change the culture..

I'd love to see Stamkos in Edmonton, but unfortunately I can't offer you any veteran playoff wi... oh wait - LUCIC!

.. he had 16 points in 17 playoff games last year. How is that his fault? Lol

That's less than his regular season scoring pace.

... it's playoffs. It's always tougher to score in playoffs. A point per game is pretty hard to do in playoffs. He's was right close to it..

Minus EIGHT this year in 4 games .. do Stamkos analysis takingbaqay PP points .. puts him with the infamous "middle" guys of Tampa ... winners win losers lose

Every single year that he was in the playoffs dating right back to his draft year the story is the same - less production in the playoffs. Here's a comparison of career postseason vs regular season p/gp:

Stamkos: 0.76 / 1.03 = 73.8%
Crosby: 1.13 / 1.29 = 87.6%
Malkin: 1.04 / 1.18 = 88.1%
Kane: 0.97 / 1.04 = 93.3%
Tavares: 0.93 / 0.94 = 98.9%
Toews: 0.86 / 0.86 = 100%
-- teammates --
Kucherov: 0.94 / 1.03 = 91.3%
Point: 0.81 / 0.86 = 94.2%
Hedman: 0.57 / 0.60 = 95%
Johnson: 0.75 / 0.66 = 113.6%
Killorn: 0.60 / 0.50 = 120%

None of these guys experience the same scoring drop that Stamkos does. I'm not musing on reasons why, I'm just pointing out the facts.