[Masters] Sheldon Keefe sur Timothy Liljegren : « C’est un gars important pour nous, mais, comme je lui en ai parlé… notre équipe est plus profonde en défense maintenant. La norme est plus élevée en termes de séjour. Il était dans une situation similaire la saison dernière.
Sheldon Keefe on Timothy Liljegren:
"He’s an important guy for us, but, as I’ve talked to him about … our team is deeper on defence now. The standard is higher in terms of staying in. He was in a similar situation last season."
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) March 7, 2023
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CTHT07
43 Comments
He would never give that quote on Justin Holl lmao
What the fuck
I like keefe a lot but this is big yikes.
Lily should be a top 4 D on this team.
Reilly – Brodie – McCabe/Gio – Liligren are our top 4, the others can rotate.
FUCK THIS SHIT. Let’s compare Holl’s advanced stats, what the absolute fuck!??!
Lilly is in our top 4 every single day. Wtf is he even saying?
Sheldon don’t you dare
I do not agree with Keefe’s assessment here. I am a big Keefe supporter but this comment concerns me. Justin Holl is not as good as Liljegren. That is my belief, maybe I am wrong but I will die on that hill.
Not gonna lie. Starting to get worried now.
Oof. I hate to say it, but if Sandin wanted out, I get why.
I could totally see Keefe continue to play Holl and Rielly and then justify it by saying « it’s all the little things they do right » when asked by reporters why he plays them, despite what the stats say.
I do like Keefe, but his repeated commitment to shit like Holl on top pair and Kerfoot on the top line is starting to piss me off. We’re 60+ games in. You know what these guys are. Holl should be bottom pair, or not playing at all. Kerfoot should be on the 4th line. Fucking stop it.
Also, give Rielly Brodie back.
You know, when I hear that kind of bullshit, it’d be nice to feel like the other guys were also being subjected to the same kind of standard…
Yea we already traded Sandin for Play time issues and shit, Lilly doesn’t need or deserve going down the same path
Oh fuck off Keefe. If Liljegren doesn’t play in the playoffs I’m enthusiastically jumping aboard the ‘fire Keefe’ train
Alienating the Swedes again are we?
The bigger questions is why is every NHL coach like this
Literally every single coach except Cooper and Granato is like this. It makes no sense
My opinion of Keefe just dropped substantially
They say sometimes the best moves are the moves you don’t make. This is the opposite of that with regards to not trading Holl
I mean he keeps putting Holl and Reilly out there together despite disastrous results…are we really surprised? Ugh just gonna start accepting the first round loss already at this point
I’m starting to think Keefe thinks he’s coaching the Raptors?
In what world has Liljegren not been the best, or maybe second best defender this year?
This pains me to say, but I sometimes wonder if Keefe really is a great coach, or if his stats are a reflection of this amazing core/roster.
Lily is at LEAST the 5th best defencemen. He should never be sitting.
Terrible take by Keefe.
Everything after the Jake McCabe trade has been awful from leafs management.
Engvall was one of our best bottom six players and a key part of the third line because he actually drove offence. David Kampf is sort of proving this right because he’s been terrible without Engvall. People say he was soft and had no finish but a third liner getting 15-20 goals is a good thing.
Trading Rasmus Sandin was fucking idiotic. People tried justifying it by saying we’d flip the first for another good player, which didn’t happen, and so then people justify it by saying he can’t defend against playoff calibre teams.
You know who can’t defend against ANYONE? Whether it’s game 7 of the playoffs or game 50 of the regular season against the Arizona Coyotes? Morgan Rielly. Choosing Rielly from ages 28-36 over Sandin at 22 who is already better at defending and showed he could handle a bigger role when our entire blueline was dead earlier this season, was a stupid choice. You might say you don’t trade Reilly at the deadline, and that’s valid, but they also didn’t have to trade Sandin at the deadline either. Rielly’s contract sucks and every year since his PDO bender in 2019 people have been saying “oh he’s playing hurt he’ll be back”, yeah he’ll be back to giving up 2 on 1s 5 or 6 times per game.
The leafs have proven to be unable to score enough goals in elimination games, and don’t exactly light up the scoreboard in general in the playoffs. Management decided that they would commit to bringing in more players who don’t score so that they can win games 0 to -1.
Yay, at least we got the 32nd god damn pick for a top 4 defenceman, and now we get to see Timothy Liljegren, who might actually be budding into a top pair defender, sit for fucking Luke Schenn.
I already watched Luke Schenn suck at playing hockey for my favourite team, why are they trying to make Luke Schenn a thing again? He’s not good, people. He just hits things.
Nope nope nope. Keefe, you know more about hockey than me but this decision is fucking asinine.
This is ridiculous. He’s literally our best defenseman. This could be a Babcock quote.
Misusing Sandin to the point of “needing to trade him”.
Trading for 3 d men at the deadline – 2 of which are clearly worse than both Sandin and Liljigren (McCabe debatable).
Forcing Liljigren out of the lineup since the “standard is higher” even though 2 of the players they brought in are head and shoulders worse than Liljigren.
This is all going really well great job Leafs. Looking forward to trading Liljigren for a late first next year because there is “no place for him in the lineup”. Wait – that won’t happen because this clown show management and coaching staff will be long gone.
This is giving me huge Mike Babcock vibes… and what I mean by that is complete and utter stubbornness on Keefe’s part.
Keefe is so full of shit. Just say u have a preference dont bs when we all see that Lily is clearly a better dman
They’re re-signing Holl for next season, aren’t they
* looks at roster, skims over Holl. « Our standard is higher now »
I get seeing where our D Core is without Lily in it, but I’m sorry, Lily is one of our best defensemen and I don’t think we got anywhere without him in the lineup, at this point he needs to be a regular (give or take some workload games)
Looking forward to typing up a long and detailed analysis with supporting figures explaining how badly the Leafs fucked up the trade deadline and their post deadline lineup in June. Will be a nice farewell to Dubas and co.
This is ludicrous. The eye test and the advanced stats back up that Liljegren is one of our best defenders. At this point he should not be competing for anything, but be a staple in our top 4. Schenn and Gustafson are one dimensional players, Holl is decent but makes mistakes that would get other guys benched and even Reilly has been an absolute shell of himself this year.
Keefe can say all he wants about how deep the defence is, but there is just nothing to back up Lilly being out of the lineup when any of those guys are drawing in while playing like they currently are. I’m all for getting guys some rest, or even the benefits of sitting someone out for a bit to try and get some sort of response, but if we go into the playoffs and Liljegren isn’t in the lineup that seems like a complete failure of coaching and player analysis.
Fire him.
I liked Dubas trade deadline moves at the time but now if the idea of getting Schenn was replacing Liljegren. I’m starting to lose faith in those last 3 trades.
This is such a jackass quote Sheldon.
Buddy says “deeper” yet has Holl cemented in that lineup… ffs
I think if Lily is out for someone else in the playoffs, I’m off the Keefe train.
Dont blame sandin for wanting out, lily has constantly had to prove people wrong since he was drafted and is still being put in the doghouse.
Fire him
Mike Babcock is so infuriating by not playing the best players in our lineup.
Wait, what year is it?
Losing faith in Keefe. How can you objectively look at the lineup and decide to scratch him over multiple other defensemen? Eye test and statistics back this up.
If he sits Liljegren for Schenn and/or Holl Ill be fully aboard the fire Keefe train. He’s as stubborn as Babcock sometimes.
Keefe has lost his ever loving mind. Confidence level is at all time low this season after running sandin out of town and now talking about sitting Lilly over holl or schenn. This is garbage