[Masters] Sheldon Keefe: “We’ve got a good team here, good players. As a staff, we need to do a better job with them & recognize our own role in getting the team to play to its potential. I would say about 50% of the games, we’ve been really good. That’s not enough”
Sheldon Keefe: "We've got a good team here, good players. As a staff, we need to do a better job with them & recognize our own role in getting the team to play to its potential. I would say about 50% of the games, we've been really good. That's not enough"https://t.co/EWLC398Wxi
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) February 7, 2024
by DevOpsMakesMeDrink
32 Comments
Solving the problems to race for the playoff 🏃♂️
How many times do we have to hear the same stuff and then see nothing change again?
Lol the team certainly doesn’t have some good players.
Sorry but what the actual fuck? How many years have you been a head coach Sheldon? You’re telling me years later, you still can’t get the team to play to its full potential? You’re obviously not suited for this team. Of course all the blame can’t go to the coach, you have a team that thinks they can coast through games and win off skill alone.
God what a mess this team is. This season is just an indicator of what is to come with the future of this team. Money hungry players that care about the bag first and foremost while taking the richest franchise in the league for a ride and producing absolutely no fucking results other than one series win. I’m sick of this.
I really hope that behind the scenes Keefe is telling management that this roster is simply not good enough. The decline compared to last year has been painfully noticeable. This roster does not have it and it’s frustrating to watch right now.
time is ticking tik tok
They’re going to miss the playoffs if they don’t find another gear and soon.
How many years has it been and Keefe is just realizing this now?
There at least seems to be awareness that coaching is a fundamental problem and not necessarily the make up of the team.
And keefe is what? The 5th longest serving coach in the NHL?
God just fire the guy already
What does Keefe actually do by way of coaching? I don’t mean that as some negative rhetorical, I’m actually asking.
Keefe tinkers with lineups and he’s pretty good at coaches challenges. But what else does he do? He talks about the staff role in getting the team to play to its potential – what does that actually entail?
What does Keefe work on with Marner mentally, to keep his head right? How does he make sure we see more of swagger fishbowl Mitch and not terrified baby Mitch?
What work has been done with Nylander and confronting his obvious decline in play since his big signing?
What does Keefe do with John on helping him to be the best captain he can be?
What is said in a first intermission when the team didn’t show up on time? What is said in a second intermission to ensure they don’t give up yet another lead?
I don’t expect specific answers to any of this, nor do I feel privy to trade secrets. Yet with Keefe, you never get any insights at all. His pressers are canned and his in-game demeanor is blank.
When we were playing Florida last year we got a look inside their dressing room. We got to see their playoffs board with 16 puck shapes slots in it; they’d ultimately slot 13 of the 16 they needed, which is a hell of a lot better than the Leafs have done in the past 5 decades. With other coaches we see bits and pieces of this, we get a glimpse into the style and process.
With Keefe we get nothing. Why is that?
Fifth season and he’s only able to get his best out of the guys 50% of the time? Please just fire him. He’s a good coach but we need a change. This year is a wash. We all know it. Can’t go all in this year so we are rolling the dice in playoffs then firing Keefe? Why wait? Roll the dice with Berube or someone else.
The biggest question this year is wtf is up with the home record!? Seriously, home advantage and line matching matters. But better yet, where is the home town hustle in the second period??
How does a coaching staff get such inconsistent results out of a roster with this much talent.
Trying to save his job
In the end, if the entire team doesn’t come to play 50% of the time, whose fault is it?
I’m not gonna full blame Keefe. This team is dog water in structure. There’s more to this than just what Keefe can do, you took away his defensively responsible depth or plain out didn’t sign them. The same holes in June are the same holes right now and weren’t addressed. The players brought in for offensive impact just aren’t being that impactful. We’ve seen Keefe’s teams be consistent in team defense for over 4 years – I wonder what has changed? Don’t fumble GM decisions with two months to go before the season, saw this coming a mile away.
I don’t think losing Dubas was gonna make the org crumble, but it for sure was going to fuck the team up if the correct and needed moves weren’t made – there was no room for error this off-season and the brass made a big one.
I think its time to start looking for a new coach.
If we are losing because the top guys aren’t scoring, then so be it.
If we are losing because the goalie sucks, thats a GM issue.
If we are losing because the depth lines on this team consistently not good enough (no matter who seems to fill in those lines) then idk who else but the coaches can be blamed.
Keefe needs to develop some intensity and purpose into this team. They often look like they are waiting for the play to come to them, especially on offence. Thats great when u can score easily when the chances present themselves (ie. Matthews, Marner and Willy), but the rest of the team cant score that easily and end up looking useless when they only generate 1 or 2 chances a game and dont end up scoring on them.
They seem to have bought into the idea that fewer high quality chances is better than more low quality chances, but unfortunately that isnt working. We need to allow our depth lines to start following some simple structures in order to start generating more chances, even if at first those chances are lower quality. It will help them get into rhythm better too, leading in theory to more high danger chances as play develops under sustained pressure.
We have to stop treating this team like they are the 2002 Redwings and start treating them more like the 2012 Kings.
That has always been the problem ever since you were hired. They won purely on talent while being outplayed 50% of the time. Now it’s finally coming back to bite you in the regular season, not just the post-season.
All these others teams shit talk us so openly because they don’t respect us for the shit play with random snipe wins. And they’re right not to respect us.
Watching a team as bad as the oilers back end win 16 in a row and seeing the leafs barely doing anything shows you Keefe isn’t a bad coach but he isn’t doing it for us. How many times has Keefe made a decision you’ve thought he was steps ahead of the competition. Literally never
change the record, how many times a year do we hear this?
That’s a big mouth on a small man right there. Why don’t you tell your fucking team that instead of constantly whining to the media about problems we all can see?
It’s no wonder the team doesn’t respect him. He talks about them negatively behind their backs all the time when it’s his job to get them in order.
Regardless of how much better last years team was this still should be a sure playoff team. The pieces are there and the star players are playing at an elite level even to a degree they haven’t before.
Fire Keefe is a cop out answer. I like him but I’m not locked in on him opposed to a passionate coach who’s a public hard ass and demands accountability and full effort down the lineup like Cassidy, Brind’Amour or Torts. Keefe has gotten better at this and he’s rolling for the next 3 years – this season isn’t on him. He can’t deploy players properly because the proper players don’t exist on this team.
People whipped Kerfoot and I HATED that – the guy had great IQ, board play and is defensively consistent, people wanna know why they get hemmed and can’t seem to EVER get it out? Kerfoot or a guy similar is one clear example. This also goes with Schenn (major loss considering what he brought and how safe/different his style is) who should have been signed or a carbon copy of him signed.
Sam Lafferty/Acciari – look at Lafferty now on the ‘Nucks and we all knew how much it would hurt losing Acciari, both easily affordable to be resigned and had not only great forechecking and some bite but also defensively responsible that can chip in a goal or two (ACCIARI ESPECIALLY HE WAS EVERYTHING WE NEEDED)
This isn’t to say the new additions were simply duds, I really like what Max Domi brings as a playmaker as 3rd line C and I’m happy he’s gonna stay for cheap. However Bertuzzi has been a flop for 5.5M, playing okay but my man ya gotta score some goals here and we’re at the point of “just put it in the net”.
Biggest L’s that are just plain stupid was obviously Reaves and f’ing Klingberg… give me the keys no way I do these deals. Reaves for 3 yrs that can be buried after 1 season? Sure, but fuck a duck better use him properly and hope he jams otherwise what are we doing here with that AAV of 1.35?? Klingberg I was purely shocked at… no need on this team for him even if he was healthy and complete wrong type of defender for this teams needs. But I thought ok, reclamation project and if he can’t return to form he’s going to LTIR, if he does return to form at full health that’s a great PP QB and more offensive depth on the back-end…. These were thoughts in August when I was 100% sure we’d be signing or trading for a quality defensive Dman with term and that… just didn’t happen and continues to not happen.
I just don’t know what mgmt was seeing, the Leafs issues and ways to become a Vegas like team are pretty clear cut and quite simple but they won’t do them.
This team desperately needs a soft reset. Keep key core players and flush everything else and rebuild. The roster is simply not good enough. Probably can’t really be done until JT is off the books unfortunately.
Who are the good players he’s referring to? Minus the core. I can think of a few, maybe? Certainly nobody impactful… He’s content with that?
Can we get a coach that can motivate a team to buy into the system. Keefe has had enough time to get everyone in line and has shown he just can’t do it. I’m sorry ever since the time he blamed Marner for doing something stupid in the media and then back tracked his comment the next day. He has no balls to get these guys in line. Fear of your core players or upper management is no way to coach. It’s all about accountability and if you can’t make your best players feel uncomfortable for doing something stupid on the ice then why are you here.
Then coach them Sheldon you bum
Dump and chase on repeat, try scoring on the rush, maybe. Dump and chase is boring and predictable
So Keefe has joined team #FireKeefe?
I wasn’t expecting that, but I’ll take it…
Keefe came out and was critical of the team last night and once again, walking it back next morning.
Not a good look.
Perhaps they could use a bit of coaching.