Stephen Burtch

Ok 9 - 3. I doubt anyone saw that coming. James Reimer making 42 saves on 45 shots in his 3rd NHL game? Sure why not. Mikhail Grabovski, Clarke MacArthur, Nikolai Kulemin all scoring 2 goals? Sure why not. Tomas Kaberle and Kulemin posting 4 point games? Sure why not.

Youth.  Inconsistency. Promise. Growth. Development. These are all areas of concern for the Leafs fan base.  We haven't seen enough of those aspects in certain corners of this year's club. But in reality - perhaps the over-estimation of results stems from expected quality of play on

Guess what folks, so far this season, it isn't Phil Kessel. Most Leaf fans spend their time arguing over the other "top 3" players we need to skate with Kessel, and whether or not that's a valid assertion is debatable. So far this season

Mikhail Grabovski, Clarke MacArthur, Nikolai Kulemin, Phil Kessel, and Kris Versteeg. That's five players amongst the Leafs top 6 forward group, all of whom are on track to produce 20+ goals. Four of them are on track for a career high in goals. Unfortunately so far they'

Ok so we all know the Leafs have suffered this season offensively. That being said, most Leaf fans have been pleasantly surprised (or at least impressed) by the offensive output of the Clarke MacArthur, Mikhail Grabovski, Nikolai Kulemin (MGK) line. All three players are on pace for career years and

We follow the Leafs.  We're used to the highs and lows.  We know they go through down spells, and we appreciate the fun up swings, but generally speaking, things level out over time.  The NHL season is a long grind.  82 games, 7 months out of the year.

Quick, dirty, ugly... any way you describe the way the Leafs-Preds game unfolded, it all amounts to the same thing: SLUMP BUSTER. The Leafs finally got into the W column, and while they did everything they could to hand it over on a silver platter to the Predators (4 giveaway

I've noticed confidence waning in these parts.  The fan confidence poll is down to 64 and dropping.  But not all hope is lost, these things come in waves you see.  Think of the season as  series of cycles, the cycle length can vary, but generally speaking teams will

So we've all borne witness to the Leafs atrocious results in the two most recent outings.  They were manhandled by Philly on Saturday and played like warm garbage against a more competitive Rangers side in the middle of last week.  The most obvious thing about those two games

On the surface, most Leaf fans would argue Phil Kessel. He leads the team with 5 goals and 7 points, and he's definitely the team's most highly skilled offensive forward. Tyler Bozak is the Leaf's nominal top centre ice man, and Kris Versteegthe team&

So far the Leafs are 4-0-0 on the season, and Leafs nation is frothing itself up into a ball of wonderous joy.  I don't really find this to be upsetting, and lord knows we deserve a dose of fun at the expense of the rest of the NHL,

In our collective obsession with the Leafs, we may have lost sight a tad of the rest of the NHL (in our rear-view! HIGH FIVE!).  We still fixate a bit on Ottawa and Montreal, and revel in their weakness, but frankly the rest of the East is nothing to overlook.

So as of today the Leafs will likely have over $5 million in cap space, assuming Jeff Finger clears waivers and is successfully demoted to the AHL's Toronto Marlies. While it is entirely possible the brain-trust at MLSE is happy to have Finger waiting in the wings as

So looking forward to tonight's resumption of the battle of Ontario, I thought I'd provide the viewing public with a few statistical areas to keep an eye on in case the game doesn't keep them interested enough.  I'm putting the info in

October is high on the minds of many Leafs fans for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the drop of the puck for the 2010-11 NHL regular season.  It also includes the first 10 game stretch of the NHL season, which is what basically sank the

The other day I posted about Delta SOT scores for the Leafs forwards based on the previous 3 seasons in the NHL.  The stat (an invention of Puck Prospectus' Tom Awad) serves to measure the +/- rating on scoring chance generation or allowance while a given player is on

Tom Awad at Puck Prospectus has been making a habit out of adding interesting statistics to the tool kit with which NHL fans can assess their respective clubs.  GVT is a useful counting stat that gives us an idea of a player's value and contribution to the team

So earlier today I was surfing through some of the fan-posts, and struck upon the one regarding Phil Kessel's production expectations for next year.  The summary basically concluded he'll produce goals, and all will be fine... go Phil.  It was a decent piece of work, but

Between long weekends, the end of the school year, my wedding, the start of summer school, and the general hustle and bustle of life, I haven't had much time to sit down and reflect upon what the Leafs have done over the past week and a bit.  Since

Last off-season I posted an analysis of the Leafs individual players based on Zone Shift.  The concept draws on the information from Gabe Desjardins' behindthenet.ca site, specifically Zone Start and Zone Finish locations, with a couple of modifications. The way that Gabe tabulates Zone Starts is self explanatory

According to a report I read earlier today, the main issue Brian Burke has with paying Nikolai Kulemin $3 million dollars a year is he believes it's too high a dollar mark to commit to for a player of his limited NHL experience. Is that really the way

Much attention has been devoted over the past half season to the UFA market this year.  Names like Kovalchuk, Marleau, and Plekanec have all been tossed around as possible scoring forwards to aid what ails the Leafs - a lack of offensive production. The Leafs do also have some RFAs

Last week our attention was piqued by the story coming out of Chicago that Marian Hossa and his agent, Rich Winter, had selected Chicago on the basis of a regression algorithm that had allowed them to winnow down the respective teams in the NHL that would attain 100 points in

On day three of the IIHF World Championships three games featuring Leaf players took place.  Belarus defeated Kazakhstan 5-2, Russia defeated Slovakia 3-1, and Sweden defeated Norway 5-2.  Leafs featured on the score sheet in all three games so let's check out how they did shall we? Belarus:

Here's some more info/background on the Leafs players and prospects playing at the World Championships.  I will post more as the tournament progresses, so stay tuned. Christian Hanson - USA: So far in 1 game, Hanson fired the shot that was put in by Ryan Carter for