…to grasp the most basic concept in sports: sportsmanship. What was Avery doing, counting steamboats? There’s no place in pro sports for this kind of childish behaviour.
Should Avery be suspended for this? No. Should he have been penalized? I’d say 2 for unsportsmanlike conduct wouldn’t be unwarranted. Should he be called out by his teammates and coaches? You bet. Will he? Not likely.
I went 11-for-15 in my NHL playoff picks last season, so let’s see if I can match that record this year:
I saw some of Off The Record last night, and one of his guests (who kept saying “As a Leaf fan…”) questioned the leadership abilities of Daniel Alfredsson. He even went so far as to call him a “punk”. Two former Senators players were also on the panel, and disagreed vehemently with him, saying that Alfredsson not only called his teammates out in the locker room when necessary (which is his job as captain), but backed it up on the ice.
Maybe it’s because I don’t hate the Senators as most Leaf fans do, but I have nothing but respect for Alfredsson. He’s obviously an excellent player, and I think he’s a great captain as well. A couple of years ago when Alfredsson pretended to throw his stick into the crowd during a game in Toronto (as Mats Sundin had the week before), a lot of Toronto fans called him out, saying that it was classless or taunting or something. But Sundin and Alfredsson are friends off the ice, and I didn’t see it as taunting Sundin, though maybe he was taunting the crowd (something opposing players routinely do). I thought it was kind of funny, actually.
I have a lot of respect for Sundin as well, but Alfredsson has led his team to the Stanley Cup finals, something Sundin has never done for the Leafs. Then again, it’s not Sundin’s fault that the Leafs management has consistently surrounded him with substandard players (OK, maybe other than Alex Mogilny). If Sundin was playing with the likes of Spezza and Heatley instead of Jonus Hoglund and Dmitri Khristich, things might have been different.
The same guy who questioned Alfie also suggested that the Leafs not bring back Sundin next year because there would be no point. While I see where he’s coming from (if the Leafs do some serious rebuilding this summer, which it seems that they will be, there’s no way they’re going to be contending next year), I think bringing Mats back would be a good thing for the young kids that will be playing for the Leafs over the next couple of years. First off, he’s their best player. Secondly, some veteran leadership for the young players is an absolute requirement when a team is rebuilding, and the Stajans and Steens and even Antropovs of the world just aren’t going to do it.
It’s the best of times, it’s the worst of times for Leaf fans. This is the time of year we both love and hate. It seems that every year between the trade deadline (sometimes shortly before) and the end of the season, the Leafs go on a hot streak, thereby giving their fans some hope that maybe they will sneak into the playoffs and as Edmonton showed us a couple of years ago, once you’re in the playoffs anything can happen. As I said, sometimes it happens before the trading deadline, thereby “forcing” the Leafs management to make some silly last-minute deal, usually trading away kids and draft choices for some veteran way past his prime. I’ve written about this a couple of times before.
Aside: I was at the Leafs game last Saturday night, and they had a “top 10” list on the Jumbotron during a commercial break. This was the top 10 scorers in NHL history who spent time as a Toronto Maple Leaf. This included long-time Leafs like Sundin and Gilmour, but also the likes of Leetch, Housley, Nieuwendyk, Francis, and Larry Murphy, all of whom spent very little time in Toronto. At least 6 of the 10 spent two seasons or less as a Leaf, mostly near the end of their careers (though Vincent Damphousse did his Leaf time at the beginning of his career (sob)), and these are all players with 15+ year careers.
Anyway, since February 16, the Leafs are 9-5, winning 5 of 6 at one point in there. They’re beating some pretty good teams too — taking two from the Flyers, destroying the Bruins 8-2, and also beating the Capitals and Senators. They’re playing pretty good hockey these days, so we have to ask, as we do every year about this time, “Where was this two months ago, when we were still in the playoff hunt?”
Of course, it would be great for the Leafs to go on a huge winning streak and make the playoffs and continue that momentum into the second and maybe third round, but it just ain’t likely. If that can’t happen, then it would be great, though less so, for them to completely tank and lose all of their remaining games, giving themselves a better draft pick and a chance to pick up Steve Stamkos. If they can suck all of next year too and pick up John Tavares (no, not the lacrosse player, his nephew the hockey player), that would be even better.
But that’s not that likely either. I have heard people actually suggesting that the Leafs should try to lose most of their remaining games, but come on. You just can’t expect professional athletes to try to lose. No, what will probably happen is the same as in the previous couple of years: the Leafs will do pretty well for the remainder of the season and miss the playoffs by that much. Or they’ll just make the playoffs and get slaughtered in the first round. Either way, they get a low draft pick. Such is life in Leaf Nation.
I’ve got a great idea for the Leafs, but since today is the trade deadline, they’ll have to do it fast. The Leafs want to trade a bunch of their big-name players as part of rebuilding, right? (Let’s ignore for the moment the fact that all of these big-name players have no-trade clauses and have all decided not to waive them.) My idea is that the Leafs should look at who’s behind them in the standings, and trade their big-name players to those teams for nothing. Send Darcy Tucker to the Kings for a third round draft pick. Send Tomas Kaberle to Tampa Bay for some minor league schmuck who isn’t likely to make the big club anyway. Send McCabe and his big contract plus $15 million (to cover the contract) to Atlanta for a bucket of pucks.
Using this strategy, the Leafs gain lots of salary cap room, these other teams get good players for next to nothing, and by making the teams worse than them better, the Leafs have a better shot at finishing last next year and picking up John Tavares in the draft! Everybody wins!
Mats Sundin has exercised his no-trade clause, effectively preventing Cliff Fletcher from trading him and picking up the kids and draft picks that this team so desperately needs to rebuild. A lot of people are going to be angry with Sundin for doing this, saying that’s he’s putting himself ahead of the team. Well, why the hell shouldn’t he?
He’s got the clause in his contract, and has every right to exercise it. He says he doesn’t want to be a rental player because he’s not comfortable with that concept — neither am I, so I certainly can’t fault him there. He’s gotta know that by doing this, he’s pretty much guaranteeing that he will end his hockey career never having won a Stanley Cup. He’s guaranteeing that he will never again play for a team that is any better than mediocre (since even if Fletcher and whoever the next GM is do everything right, by the time the Leafs are turned into a contender, Sundin will very likely have retired). He knows those things and yet he still made the decision to stay because he wants to play for the Leafs. How can Leafs fans fault him for that?
You could argue that this decision will not help the Leafs get better in the long run, and Howard Berger goes so far as to say that it will set the Leafs back at least a full season. This is probably true, but making the Leafs a better team is not Sundin’s job, it’s (currently) Fletcher’s. Fletcher did his job by asking Sundin to waive the clause, and Sundin did what’s best for him by saying no. Mats is one of the best players ever to wear the Leaf uniform, and also one of the best Leaf captains. Given how much Sundin has given to the Leafs and this city over the past fourteen years, he doesn’t owe the Leafs anything.
I’ve been calling for the firing of John Ferguson as GM of the Leafs for almost a year now. Now that it’s happened, I’m not sure it’s the right move. Well, sort of. It’s a move that definitely needed to be done, but I’m not convinced it’s the only move that needs to be done.
On Ferguson’s watch, the Leafs have gone from a just-making-the-playoffs mediocre team to a laughing stock, bordering on the worst team in the league. Based on the moves that he has made, I believed that Ferguson was simply incompetent, and did a lousy job of running the team. In recent days, however, I’ve heard a lot about what’s gone on behind the scenes — Ferguson tried to make a number of deals that were nixed by Richard Peddie, the CEO of MLSE, and not a hockey guy. Given that, it’s quite possible that it was not entirely Ferguson’s fault. If his hands were as tied as I have been led to believe, there wasn’t much he could have done.
Having said that, as I’ve mentioned before, MLSE has treated Ferguson very badly over the last few months. His contract was going to end after this season, and MLSE didn’t bother to renew it, implying that he was going to be done after this season, and Peddie did say that hiring Ferguson was a mistake. Ferguson says it did not affect how he did his job, but I think it must have, and it more than likely affected the other GMs in the league and how they dealt with him. Over the past couple of weeks, the Leafs have all but announced that Ferguson was going to be fired, and that they were talking to Cliff Fletcher about the position, so he knew his days were numbered. Openly talking about who the next GM is when the current one is still there is just not very nice. So it was kind of unfair to Ferguson not to put him out of his misery and just fire him.
Cliff Fletcher has been hired as interim GM, and will search in the off-season for a new full-time GM for next season. MLSE has announced that “As all of our general managers have had, he will have the autonomy and responsibility for all hockey decisions…” If that’s true and Ferguson did have complete autonomy, then he’s at fault and deserved to be fired. If that’s not true, and some of his attempted moves were blocked, then Peddie should also be fired. Since the Leafs have been making money hand over fist on Peddie’s watch, I doubt that the rest of the board of directors of MLSE would even consider firing him.
There’s also been talk of firing coach Paul Maurice, which I don’t agree with. As the old saying goes, you can’t turn chicken turds into chicken salad by adding mayonnaise. Given what he had to work with, I don’t think we can look at the Leafs’ record from this year and last and conclude that it’s Maurice’s fault. Even if Maurice was the best hockey coach in the world, I’m not sure he could turn this team into a winner. I say wait until Fletcher (and whoever the next GM is) makes some moves and gives him a half-decent team, and then see what he can do.
Ironically, Cliff Fletcher was GM of the Leafs in the early 90’s, and made the trade that brought Mats Sundin to Toronto. Now his first act at GM might just be to trade Sundin away.
John Ferguson Jr. is in a tough spot. As the GM of the Leafs, it’s his job to build the Leafs into a successful team. In my opinion, he’s done a lousy job of this, and the fact that the Leafs are playing really badly, losing yesterday to the worst team in the league, is evidence of this. The right thing to do now, as I’ve believed for a couple of years, is to blow the team up and start over with young kids and draft picks. One problem with this idea is that lots of the Leafs have long expensive contracts with no-trade clauses. These will be hard to get rid of, since nobody wants to take on that big a contract unless it’s for an exceptional player, of which the Leafs have none.
And then there’s Mats Sundin. He’s been the face of the Leafs for over ten years, is a fan favourite, and is still an impact player. He has stated numerous times that he wants to remain in Toronto, but he’s by far the most tradeable player on the team, in that he’d get the most interest and the Leafs would get more for him than the rest of the team combined. The buzz around Toronto is whether or not the Leafs will trade Sundin, who’s an unrestricted free agent after this season. If they do, it’s basically an admission that they’re not going to make the playoffs this year, and that they’re trying to rebuild. As much as I love Sundin, this is the right thing to do.
I heard some hockey analysts (far more knowledgable about hockey than myself) on the radio yesterday talking about this, and they said that Philly got a couple of current players (one great, one good) and two draft picks for an injured Peter Forsberg, and that Sundin would fetch even more than that. One suggestion was that Sundin would fit in nicely on the Ottawa Senators with his good friend and fellow Swede Daniel Alfredsson. How painful would it be for Torontonians, many of whom (though not me) hate the Senators with a passion, to watch Mats Sundin hoist the Stanley Cup wearing a Sens jersey? Ouch.
But here’s Ferguson’s real problem. The Leafs’ ownership, MLSE, have not renewed his contract for next year, and Richard Peddie has gone so far as to say that hiring Ferguson was a “mistake”. The Leafs have missed the playoffs for two straight years, and are looking at a third, and it would seem that Ferguson’s only chance to not get fired would be to make the playoffs this year. So what should Ferguson do? If he trades away Sundin for prospects and draft picks, which is sacrificing this season for the future, he’s putting the Leafs in a better position going forward but all but guaranteeing that the Leafs will miss the playoffs and so he’ll probably lose his job. If he keeps Sundin, the Leafs might squeak into the playoffs but will get devastated by Ottawa (likely to finish first in the East) in the first round. He may keep his job for another year because they made the playoffs (seemingly, this milestone indicates to MLSE that the season was a complete success), but the situation next year and in future years won’t be any better. So in a nutshell, if he tries to make the team better, he gets fired. But if he keeps things the same or does nothing to prevent them from getting worse, he might just keep his job.
Or possibly MLSE will realize that trading Sundin is good for the Leafs’ future, and as long as he doesn’t get raked over the coals in the deal, maybe give Ferguson another year with these new kids — even if they do miss the playoffs this year. Sundin is also an unrestricted free agent this summer, so even if they do trade him, it’s possible that they could resign him then, and have the best of both worlds. Then again, even if they trade Sundin for Sidney Crosby and a draft pick (an arguably good deal for the Leafs, and one likely to get the Pittsburgh GM fired or, more likely, shot), they’ve still got Kubina, McCabe, Raycroft, Stajan, and bunch of other half-decent-at-best or overpaid (or both!) players. Even Crosby couldn’t carry these guys by himself.
Look at me, hoping that MLSE makes some smart decisions when it comes to the Leafs. Talk about blind optimism. Here’s what will happen: the Leafs will hold onto Sundin until he retires, and will not get noticably better in that timeframe. Then with Sundin gone, they’ll get worse.
A few scattered things…
In the past couple of years, I’ve actually hoped that the Leafs wouldn’t make the playoffs, so that this would send a clear signal to the Leafs’ management that serious changes needed to be made, not just little tweaks here and there. They’ve missed the playoffs two years running now, but nothing really significant has been done, so this year, I’m hoping the Leafs miss the playoffs again so that management is replaced. Ferguson has done a lousy job of building this team, so he needs to be sent packing. I’m hoping that Tannenbaum et al have noticed the dramatic changes in the Raptors after they went out and got Bryan Colangelo (last year’s NBA Executive of the Year); maybe that will force them to rethink the Leafs’ situation. Rather than just getting some guy to run the Leafs, they need to go out and get the guy — someone with a proven track record who is not afraid to blow the team up and rebuild. I have no idea who the guy is (would Lou Lamoriello ever leave New Jersey?), but Ferguson just ain’t getting the job done.
Wil Wheaton has a new book out called “The Happiest Days of our Lives”, which is a collection of some of his best blog entries, and talking about the best blog entries on Wil’s blog is really saying something. I ordered the book a few weeks ago, and shortly after, Wil (I call him “Wil” like he’s a friend of mine) complained that the Canadian orders had to be processed by hand, and he was doing it himself (Monolith Press, who’s publishing the book, is Wil’s own publishing company). Lo and behold, my book arrived last week, and the envelope had a customs sticker on it signed by Wil himself. It’s not an autographed book, but pretty close…
When I first got my iPod, I spent a month putting all my music on it, and as an afterthought, I subscribed to a couple of podcasts. Since then, I’ve found that my main use for the iPod is listening to these podcasts on my way to and from work every day. I don’t know how I’d manage this if I didn’t have a 45-minute-each-way commute. Since you asked (lookin’ at you, CaHwyGuy), here are my podcasts:
I have also downloaded, listened to, and enjoyed a couple of audiobooks from audible.com. So far, I have only listened to audiobooks from guys named Stephen: Hawking’s “A Brief History of Time” and Colbert’s “I Am America (And So Can You)”. Just the title of that second one is enough to make me giggle, and the rest of the book is also very funny; I literally laughed out loud on numerous occasions while listening to it.
I found this on Boing Boing, and could not stop laughing. Author John Scalzi has written a review of the Creation Museum in Kentucky, which is a museum that promotes “young Earth” creationism, i.e. the Bible is literally true, and the Earth was created in 6 24-hour days about 6000 years ago. The other things that these young Earth creationists also believe are mind-boggling:
The whole creationist thing seems to come from the dizzying logic that “the Bible must be true because it’s the word of God. How do we know it’s the word of God? It says so in the Bible.” It’s best explained by this.
Why oh why do they do this? Why do the Leafs (and probably other teams too) dump the puck into the offensive zone, and then chase after it? If they’ve got possession, why wouldn’t they keep possession, rather than voluntarily give it up and then try to fight to get it back? I just watched the last five minutes of the Leafs-Senators game, and the Leafs, despite being a goal down and desperate to score, kept doing this. I don’t get it. They pulled their goalie, so they’re up 6-on-5. A defenceman races forward with the puck, his forwards are waiting at the blue line, but instead of crossing the blue line with the forwards right behind him and trying to make a play, he dumps it into the corner from the neutral zone, then everyone skates in to try and get it back from the Ottawa defenders. This almost always failed, and the Sens dumped the puck back out. This was repeated a number of times before time ran out and the Sens won the game.
Maybe it’s because I’ve watched a lot more lacrosse than hockey in the past few years, and possession in lacrosse is everything. In hockey, it’s easier to dump the puck in and try to get it back, whereas in lacrosse you don’t give up possession for anything. But I still don’t get it.
Cut The Chatter, Red Two 