What should the Leafs do?

The Leafs need a new GM and a coach. Starting from scratch from up top. People who are dumb say the Leafs should just throw everything away and get Tavares and rebuild. I will point out that doesn't work that well and teams don't have to be out of the playoffs to make it. You only have to rebuild when your team makes a cup run and ultimately fails. Toronto hasn't done that inawhile, it's more about making smart decisions and drafting well. Philadelphia didn't need to rebuild, they brought in Briere, Timonen, Biron, Lupul, Hartnell while making some smart moves to refill their team. Those acquisitions cost a ton of money and they even missed the services of Simone Gagne. The real story is that their moves WORKED.

The fact is you need star players and people who give you equal value to what you're paying them or more.

The first strategy of "playing" for Tavares would require the trade of first and foremost goaltender Vesa Toskala. I think it's a fact he's here to stay and he can be good enough to take a shitty team to stay out of the basement.

Buy out:
Andrew Raycroft (salary = 2.2 M, cap hit = 2M, buy out amount = $1.47M, split over 2 years = 0.733M/ year) equates to 1.2 M savings this year with a 733K cap hit next season.
-Not a bad move to save 1.2 M, can get a decent player to sign for cheap, the 733K is no different from having Ed Belfour's contract on our payroll like the past 2 seasons

Think about buying out Mark Bell:
I wouldn't do it but if you do buy him out that would be 1.6 M saved with 800K carrying over to next season.

Don't buy out Darcy Tucker or Jason Blake. Tucker would have a 6M buyout spread over 6 years which would equate to 1M per year. Toronto would only save 2M for those 3 years and paying for it for the next 3. He adds more to this team then 2M and shouldn't be considered a sunk cost.

Jason Blake: 10M buy out over 8 years with a 1.25M cap hit each year. Would actually save $3.25M the first two years and then only $1.75M the next two years (or 2.75M in cap space). I'd rather wait this one out. The cap hits may be different. Don't have a complete understanding of the rules.

How about McCabe: Buy out = 9.63M which would be spread out over 6 years. This one I would consider as you can probably get a better player for that 5 million in extra space. Otherwise try to trade him

Bye:
John Pohl -non existant
Andy Wozniewski - no room for you

Keep Sundin...if he gives an appropriate discount. Nothing more then $5 million. Makes no sense for him to take up cap space when he claims he would like to win. The Leafs need cap space badly.

I would not trade Kubina. Toronto needs him and if we trade Kubina it would mean we would be stuck with McCabe (shudders).

Toronto needs to bring in some top of the line players as our high priced guys have sucked but for the most part one big name needs to be outed and some prude and cheap moves COULD shore up this team.

I would consider trading either Ponikarovsky or Antropov. Usually one seems to be one while the other struggles. These guys are horses and teams are looking for these kinds of guys. Antropov looks like he wants to stay but at what cost? He's a free agent and may be worth while to trade before the free agent deadline.

I'll look at the possible takers for McCabe but they probably won't take him.