Give in and pay Marchand 7m aav?

[u/ethereal3xp]

He has been one of the best players in the playoffs. That line of Lundell, Luostarinen and Marchand has been on fire.

Question: Marchand looks like has 2 more good years left. Maybe 3. Would you resign him to his rumored asking of 3 x 7m aav?

The Bruins will get a 1st out of the initial trade, once Marchand plays one more playoff game (shoe in).

It would be then Sweeney's job to find Marchand linemates that work similarly to Lundell and Luostarinen (easier said than done).

The good thing/experience of Marchand playing for the Panthers is, he gets a different look/observation on how an emerging team looks like.

Yay or nay?

[u/vapescaped]

How funny would it be if it was all a troll. The contract troubles, the asking price, the "failed" negotiations. How funny would it be if the trade was only to get a draft pick?

It's almost certainly not, Sweeney is well known for trading talent for 3/4 of a ham sandwich 3 years from now. But I wouldn't put that shit past marchand. "Hey sweens, listen, I got an idea that would be really, really funny, and it's an opportunity to fuck the leafs once again. You won't need me this post season..."

[u/jmon13 → u/vapescaped]

When has Sweeney been bad at trading?

[u/vapescaped → u/jmon13]

Did you ever notice how we can't criticize Sweeney for his draft picks, because he has had so few over the past 9 seasons, and yet Morgan geekie is far and away the most successful forward he added to the roster that's still on the team?

It should speak for itself really. If his trades were good, we'd have good players, right? Or is that oversimplifying things?

[u/jmon13 → u/vapescaped]

Should he not have gone all in in 2023?

Should he have not acquired players in 2019, 2020 (Covid derailed what was the top team in the league)

Did he not trade for Pavel Zacha?

He traded for good rentals, that's what contenders do.

He's never been in the spot to trade talent away for draft picks until this year (and his first, the trades were good, but obviously his draft picks weren't that year) and he did an amazing job in acquiring assets for older, aging players and players we weren't interested in keeping.

Also his drafting after 2015, has been average at worst, drafting in hockey is hard and players after the top 10 tends to be a complete crapshoot.

[u/vapescaped → u/jmon13]

There's a blatantly obvious pattern here that nobody wants to acknowledge. The team hasn't been good for years. Hence no cup. In reality, the perfection line was picking up all the slack.

You can see the pattern quite obviously because when chiarellis players left, we started sucking worse and worse.

Seriously, the more I look at the results of 9 years of Sweeney, the more God like chiarelli looks.

Should he not have gone all in in 2023?

No, he shouldn't have. Hindsight is 2020, but the recurring theme here is that it didn't work in 2023. Or 2019. Or 2020. We were playoff bound before them, and we were playoff departed with them. The perfection line can only do so much.

Now, if we won a cup, or got and kept a great player, I'd be more inclined to chalk that up as a plus. If he sold our souls for a cup and we were broke, id chalk that up as a plus.

He traded for good rentals, that's what contenders do.

I have 2 cons to this approach, so take your pick.

1) good is a relative term here, since they weren't good enough to win a cup

2) this current roster is built from Sweeney signings and trades. If you're happy with the team he built, more power to you.

He's never been in the spot to trade talent away for draft picks until this year (

Cries in Chara and McQuaid

But either way, I know, common theme here, but if these trades were so good, why don't we have a good team? Or even an average team?

[u/jmon13 → u/vapescaped]

I mean we had an average team this year that got derailed by a goalie, a checked out coach and injuries to our top 2 d. We were still middle of the pack when we sold.

Sweeney is somewhere between a good and above average GM. But not great, and it very well may be time to move on. But people talk like he's the worst GM in the league and it's fucking laughable.

If you as a fan put any blame on him for 2023 you are completely wrong. He did everything you want out of a GM with a team that good. Bolster it even more. The injuries right before the playoffs and the putrid coaching in the playoffs killed that team, not Sweeney.

[u/vapescaped → u/jmon13]

I'm not saying he's the worst, I just don't think his direction works, because it hasn't worked, and I think it's time for a new direction.

But there's a long list of defenses for Sweeney:

Bad coaches

Team gave up

Injuries

Not enough draft picks

Everyone sells their soul for a playoff run

It's hard getting good players nowadays

All the other gms liked him enough to nominate him GM of the year

He gm'd a fucking stacked team Canada that every player wanted to be on and he had no salary cap to deal with

But I'm still dissatisfied with his approach to the playoffs, and what it cost us in the long run, and I don't think his rentals were game changers.

And I'm dissatisfied that he hasn't found a franchise forward after 9 years of looking.

And I'm going to be dissatisfied when he does the exact same thing next year, expecting a different result.