Chris Johnston

This is their first season out of the playoffs after nine years in, and they still have Matthews signed for two years and Willie signed for many more than that.

I think just on those circumstances alone, there's no way you do full rebuild.

Now, I suppose if Matthews did come at the end of the season and said, OK, I want out, that changes things.

But I don't believe that's necessarily going to be the case here.

I do think that there's a, you know, he and Nylander and any other veteran associated with this team is going to want to know what the direction is, what the plan is, who's making those calls, who's coaching the team.

There's a lot of questions, I think, that are going to start.

to be answered come mid-April when their last game has been played and some of those things get rolled out.

But at this point, I'm operating under the feeling that they're going to try to pivot on the fly and be more competitive next season because

You know, whether they get this top five pick this year, let's just say they get lucky, they win the draft lottery.

That means their 27 pick and 28 pick is spoken for.

And so there's no incentive there to be bad because you're not getting the main benefit of being bad.

The main benefit of being bad is getting those top picks, getting those players in your program.

So I actually think because of the circumstances, they're going to have to do their best to be the best they can be.

I just don't know how good that is.

I mean, fair point.

One thing on what you guys were just saying, though, I've had some conversations with people that work at 50 Bay Street.

They're concerned about the opposite, Brian, of what you brought up.

They're concerned everyone's too resigned to what's going on, that there isn't maybe enough.

And not that anyone's hoping anyone's throwing anything on the ice or chanting.

I'm not saying that, but they're almost worried the fan base is like a little...