That opening roster last year is brutal. Third and fourth lines were non-existant. Roy was ok but had nothing to work with. Macelli was brutal, McMann was decent but a one trick pony. The 24/25 one is better but Holmberg and Kampf as 3/4C? Patches had stretches but always injured, Benoit and Timmins were meh, Domi playing too high in the lineup. So, so many holes.
I am worried we don't have enough offense through the lineup now, but at least we have a bomb threat in Raddysh and Mo or OEL can be on PP2 and Cowan and McKenna can improve over time. I really, really hope the third and fourth lines can really grind teams down so the top two lines can get to scoring. I'm also really hoping we can get a 2C via trade at some point and move JT to 3C or the wing.
I wonder how true that is about the offence. With an absolutely dreadful season last year the team put up 253 goals. They also gave up a dreadful 299 goals. That was a team that had Matthews, Nylander and Knies injured and playing through injury. It was a blue line that had McCabe hurt, Tanev out of the year (not a point producer but absolutely a guy who can transition the puck up the ice without immediately turning over possession) and really no-one to play the blue line on the PP. It was a team that got absolutely nothing out of their bottom 6 despite Berube heavily starting them outside the defensive zone.
Obviously this team needs guys to rebound to more career numbers BUT
Matthews - 45 goals (maybe a bit optimistic but a healthy Matthews should be able to do this)
Nylander - 40 goals (essentially his pace the past 4 years)
Tavares - 30 goals (essentially his goal total every year as a Leaf)
Knies - 30 goals (career high 29 so far)
Roslovic - 20 goals (back to back seasons)
Paul - 20 goals (scored 17, 24, 22 before only scoring 7 last year in an injury plagued season)
Bluegar/Duhaime/Joshua/Lorentz - 20 goals
Cowan - 15 goals
McKenna - 15 goals
Sissons - 10 goals
Other than banking on Matthews to have a rebound season that doesn't seem like those numbers are really out in left field. Its just guys essentially playing at their career pace for the last 2-4 years. That's 245 goals from the forward group.
OEL/Rielly/McCabe/Stecher put up 25 goals last year. You would hope that adding Raddysh and then to a lesser extent having guys like Blankenburg/Andrae instead of Myers/Mermis/Carlo/Benoit who put up a combined 1 goal should at least be able to bump that number up to 30 goals from the back end. That would put the team around 275 goals which would have been a top 10 offence last year.
Obviously that's an optimistic forecast for the team. But I don't think its being completely delusional either.
