You probably wont agree with all of these, some might not even agree with any of these, but here are some takes that I have. I can explain in the comments
-The Leafs have a top 7 defense corps in the league
-Loui Eriksson is not a plug, he is still a decent 3rd liner (contract still sucks)
-Esa Lindell is a bottom pairing defenseman at best
-Marc-Andre Fleury has not done enough to be inducted to the Hall of Fame
-Jared Spurgeon is a top 10 defenseman in the NHL
-Jim Benning is worse than Peter Chiarelli
-Calgary won the Lucic-Neal swap
-Carey Price is not a top 31 goalie in the league anymore
-Jake Muzzin has been a better defenseman than Drew Doughty since the start of Muzzin's career
-Seth Jones is not a top 50 defenseman
-Paul Maurice should be fired
I feel like with the skill level on the Jets up front, they should be relying on hellebuyck to bail them out every game.
Schiefele and Connor are both highly skilled, but with the way they are deployed, they are 2 of the worst defensive forwards in the league. Laine too, but hes gone
Loui isnt even a third liner. hes a defensive specialist. you have to at least have a bit of offensive impact to be a proper middle 6 guy
Never said he was a middle 6 guy. Just a 3rd liner. Tons of teams have guys without much offense on their 3rd lines. Loui's offensive impact isnt even awful, hes just below average
I feel like with the skill level on the Jets up front, they should be relying on hellebuyck to bail them out every game.
Schiefele and Connor are both highly skilled, but with the way they are deployed, they are 2 of the worst defensive forwards in the league. Laine too, but hes gone
Schiefele is not crap at defensive
Conner is pretty bad tho
Of course Calgary won the Lucic-Neal swap, the league moved its own goalposts in order to give Calgary a draft pick. Even if Neal outperforms Lucic in every facet, it was still a swap of bad deals. The fact that the Flames got out with a 3rd rounder despite conditions not being met is ludicrous.
Never said he was a middle 6 guy. Just a 3rd liner. Tons of teams have guys without much offense on their 3rd lines. Loui's offensive impact isnt even awful, hes just below average
Of course Calgary won the Lucic-Neal swap, the league moved its own goalposts in order to give Calgary a draft pick. Even if Neal outperforms Lucic in every facet, it was still a swap of bad deals. The fact that the Flames got out with a 3rd rounder despite conditions not being met is ludicrous.
Yeah, the league always errs on the side of "screw Edmonton" whenever they can. Watch what happens with Klefbom / expansion draft eligibility this summer...
With the Neal-Lucic trade, the Oilers still got the cheaper buyout and no NMC. Neal can be moved to the minors / taxi squad if he's not playing well - saving $1.075M in cap space - while Lucic cannot. And Calgary has to protect Lucic in the Seattle draft - imagine that!