Auston Matthews

[Arn]

There's definitely a lot of recency bias on my opinions, but I'm sticking by them  ;D

It's a much more fun discussion to have, though, than is Phaneuf better than McCabe or something

 

[Joe S.]

Sundin was clearly the best player the Leafs have had in my time (since the late 90s).

Matthews is already better, I feel.

I'm still not prepared to go quite that far. I think Sundin, in a more wide open league, would have been something very different than what we saw.

And I don't think I'd equate a 30 year old Sundin getting to play off and on with a past his prime(although still very good) 32 year old Mogilny to what Marner and Matthews have going on. Sundin's best year was him scoring 94 points on a team whose top three scoring wingers were Berezin, Clark and Todd Warriner.

I was about to post something similar. In no way am I trying to start a Sundin vs Matthews debate, they are very different players, but what sundin was able to do with the talent he had around him has to be taken in consideration, especially considering the era he played in. And the mogilny the leafs got was the shadow of his former self. He was great in bursts when his back would allow it. But that?s the closest Sundin ever got to having a first line winger. I don?t care what anyone says, Gary Roberts was not a first line winger, not at that stage of his career.

Look at how he played whenever he had actual stats around him when he played for Sweden.

Anyway, nothing wrong with having 2 favourite players of all time.

 

[Guilt Trip]

Sundin was clearly the best player the Leafs have had in my time (since the late 90s).

Matthews is already better, I feel.

I'm still not prepared to go quite that far. I think Sundin, in a more wide open league, would have been something very different than what we saw.

And I don't think I'd equate a 30 year old Sundin getting to play off and on with a past his prime(although still very good) 32 year old Mogilny to what Marner and Matthews have going on. Sundin's best year was him scoring 94 points on a team whose top three scoring wingers were Berezin, Clark and Todd Warriner.

I was about to post something similar. In no way am I trying to start a Sundin vs Matthews debate, they are very different players, but what sundin was able to do with the talent he had around him has to be taken in consideration, especially considering the era he played in. And the mogilny the leafs got was the shadow of his former self. He was great in bursts when his back would allow it. But that?s the closest Sundin ever got to having a first line winger. I don?t care what anyone says, Gary Roberts was not a first line winger, not at that stage of his career.

Look at how he played whenever he had actual stats around him when he played for Sweden.

Anyway, nothing wrong with having 2 favourite players of all time.

Sundin literally carried the opposing team on his back when he played. The great clutch and grab era of hockey. He was awesome and one of the top 10 Leafs of all time. While not quite at that level yet Matthews is without a doubt the best goal scorer I've seen in a Leafs uni. He's such a treat to watch.

 

[Joe S.]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

 

[Guilt Trip]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

Yup.

 

[dappleganger]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

You know who else does that? Auston Freakin' Matthews, that's who!

 

[Arn]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

You know who else does that? Auston Freakin' Matthews, that's who!

yeah I think that's one of the similarities they have that I really enjoy watching. Not many can do that.

 

[Joe S.]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

You know who else does that? Auston Freakin' Matthews, that's who!

Yup and it?s awesome.

 

[bustaheims]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

You know who else does that? Auston Freakin' Matthews, that's who!

Yeah. Every so often, you see Matthews go on a shift where it's clear he's just like "I'm going to score a goal now," and he absolutely owns the other team. Fun to watch.

 

[L K]

Remember when the leafs would be down by a goal and Sundin would go into beast mode for the last 2 minutes? It didn?t always work, but you always knew you?d be in for an exciting last minute of play.

You know who else does that? Auston Freakin' Matthews, that's who!

Yeah. Every so often, you see Matthews go on a shift where it's clear he's just like "I'm going to score a goal now," and he absolutely owns the other team. Fun to watch.

I love when a player takes a bit of a run at him and you clearly see him flash red.  He follows that up by stealing the pucks a half dozen times in the next few shifts and generating multiple scoring chances of not a goal

 

[Nik]

I was about to post something similar. In no way am I trying to start a Sundin vs Matthews debate, they are very different players, but what sundin was able to do with the talent he had around him has to be taken in consideration, especially considering the era he played in. And the mogilny the leafs got was the shadow of his former self. He was great in bursts when his back would allow it. But that?s the closest Sundin ever got to having a first line winger. I don?t care what anyone says, Gary Roberts was not a first line winger, not at that stage of his career.

Thing is, I think sometimes people misstate the thing about Sundin by saying "He had bad wingers" which, while true, really doesn't tell the extent of the story. In an era when the successful teams had #2Cs that were bound for the Hall of Fame like Forsberg, Fedorov or Nieuwendyk, the Leafs never came close to that. Between when Gilmour left and when the Leafs signed Nieuwendyk, which was the six seasons from when Sundin was 26-32, the Leafs only had a #2 C on the team score 50 points twice. Once when Yanic Perreault scored 52 and once when Reichel scored 51. The best offensive year a Leafs defenseman had in that time period was probably Kaberle scoring 47 points in 02-03.

So basically for all of Sundin's prime, opposing teams could throw their entire team at him and not be afraid of anyone else on the Leafs roster hurting them. Like you say, the one time Sundin was on a team in his prime where they really couldn't do that, the 2002 Olympics, he had 5 goals and 9 points in 4 games and looked pretty close to being the best player in the world.

 

[Joe S.]

Yeah absolutely agreed. I remember clearly back then, on these boards , I would get into arguments saying that the biggest hole the leafs had was another centre. Forsberg/Sakic, yzerman/Federov etc. You can?t convince me that if you swap forsberg and Sundin the Avs still don?t have at least 1 cup.

 

[herman]

I'm just trying to imagine how good Sundin would have been without the smoking and with today's sticks and skates.

 

[Nik]

I'm just trying to imagine how good Sundin would have been without the smoking and with today's sticks and skates.

I wouldn't be too quick to assume. I feel like a lot of his super powers were nicotine related.

 

[Bender]

I was about to post something similar. In no way am I trying to start a Sundin vs Matthews debate, they are very different players, but what sundin was able to do with the talent he had around him has to be taken in consideration, especially considering the era he played in. And the mogilny the leafs got was the shadow of his former self. He was great in bursts when his back would allow it. But that?s the closest Sundin ever got to having a first line winger. I don?t care what anyone says, Gary Roberts was not a first line winger, not at that stage of his career.

Thing is, I think sometimes people misstate the thing about Sundin by saying "He had bad wingers" which, while true, really doesn't tell the extent of the story. In an era when the successful teams had #2Cs that were bound for the Hall of Fame like Forsberg, Fedorov or Nieuwendyk, the Leafs never came close to that. Between when Gilmour left and when the Leafs signed Nieuwendyk, which was the six seasons from when Sundin was 26-32, the Leafs only had a #2 C on the team score 50 points twice. Once when Yanic Perreault scored 52 and once when Reichel scored 51. The best offensive year a Leafs defenseman had in that time period was probably Kaberle scoring 47 points in 02-03.

So basically for all of Sundin's prime, opposing teams could throw their entire team at him and not be afraid of anyone else on the Leafs roster hurting them. Like you say, the one time Sundin was on a team in his prime where they really couldn't do that, the 2002 Olympics, he had 5 goals and 9 points in 4 games and looked pretty close to being the best player in the world.

And I mean, maybe this isn't a fair comparison, but Jagr had a bunch of really shitty Penguins teams that he was on when Lemiuex wasn't around and he still put up a ton of points in comparison. If we're arguing Sundin was one of the best in the world the way Matthews is, wouldn't he be a bit closer in that regard? Then again I can't imagine Jagr playing a two way game...

 

[Nik]

And I mean, maybe this isn't a fair comparison, but Jagr had a bunch of really shitty Penguins teams that he was on when Lemiuex wasn't around and he still put up a ton of points in comparison. If we're arguing Sundin was one of the best in the world the way Matthews is, wouldn't he be a bit closer in that regard? Then again I can't imagine Jagr playing a two way game...

Well, one, I think there's a pretty good argument to be made that Jagr is maybe the 3rd best offensive hockey player of all time behind Lemieux and Gretzky so it's a tough comparison to make but even then I don't think the issue with Jagr was ever quite as bad as it was with Sundin. Lemieux missed three seasons(three and a half really but even in half a season Lemieux put up 25 more points than any C Sundin played with in the 6 relevant years) and in those three years Jagr wasn't quite a one man band:

97-98: Francis
98-99: Straka, Kovalev
99-00: Straka, Kovalev

In 97-98 Jagr had 102 points. The next three highest scoring Penguins(Francis, Stu Barnes, Kevin Hatcher) had 200 points. Sundin scored 74 points. The next three highest scoring Leafs(Mike Johnson, Derek King, Igor Korolev) had 132 points.

Edit: Interestingly enough, before this post my memory was like yours. That Jagr played on some gawd-awful post-Lemieux Penguins teams but it's not really true. Jagr never missed the playoffs with the Penguins. It was after his trade to the Capitals that the Penguins went from a middling playoff team to the bottom feeding bankruptcy devastated team that landed all those high draft picks in a row.

 

[Kaberle15]

We should do a list of Leaf's records that Matthews already broke, and the ones that he still needs to brake.
The way he is playing with Marner, not even Sittler's 10 point game is safe.

in my Lifetime of being a Leaf fan, and see the great runs of 92-93-94 and 2001-2002-2003 and see Gilmour, Clark, Sundin, Mogilny, Thomas, etc by far Marner and Matthews are the most skilled ones, we are probably seeing the two greatest Maple Leafs of all time.

And none of that matters if they can't manage to find success in the playoffs.

But one thing that changed this season is that Marner is not only passing he is a genuine-almost-30-goal scorer and that has open Matthews a little bit more, the run they are both in, if they replicate it at the Playoffs, no one is going to stop the Leafs.

I want Matthews to smash every possible record as Leaf that he can and also win the Stanley Cup with the Leafs (this year).

 

[ZBBM]

I was about to post something similar. In no way am I trying to start a Sundin vs Matthews debate, they are very different players, but what sundin was able to do with the talent he had around him has to be taken in consideration, especially considering the era he played in. And the mogilny the leafs got was the shadow of his former self. He was great in bursts when his back would allow it. But that?s the closest Sundin ever got to having a first line winger. I don?t care what anyone says, Gary Roberts was not a first line winger, not at that stage of his career.

Thing is, I think sometimes people misstate the thing about Sundin by saying "He had bad wingers" which, while true, really doesn't tell the extent of the story. In an era when the successful teams had #2Cs that were bound for the Hall of Fame like Forsberg, Fedorov or Nieuwendyk, the Leafs never came close to that. Between when Gilmour left and when the Leafs signed Nieuwendyk, which was the six seasons from when Sundin was 26-32, the Leafs only had a #2 C on the team score 50 points twice. Once when Yanic Perreault scored 52 and once when Reichel scored 51. The best offensive year a Leafs defenseman had in that time period was probably Kaberle scoring 47 points in 02-03.

So basically for all of Sundin's prime, opposing teams could throw their entire team at him and not be afraid of anyone else on the Leafs roster hurting them. Like you say, the one time Sundin was on a team in his prime where they really couldn't do that, the 2002 Olympics, he had 5 goals and 9 points in 4 games and looked pretty close to being the best player in the world.

Excellent points, Nik. 

And Marner is somewhat better than Hoglund, Renberg, etc.

This is a fun debate.

 

[ZBBM]

The problem is, in a couple of years when it's time to re-sign Matthews I'm not sure how Dubas is going manage to fit in the Deed to the Province of Ontario under the cap.  But he's creative, and I think he'll figure out something.

 

[Joe S.]

I?m just thankful that we got to talking about Sundin again for a bit.