Another season closes, and we’ve been told the same old story. This season followed a very predictable Maple Leafs storyline: The team comes out of the gate swinging in October and were able to keep pace in the standings while riding a high shooting percentage, and soon realize that this playing style is unsustainable. Things heated up in November when the Leafs were crushed by the Nashville Predators 9-2. Head Coach Randy Carlyle was handed the blame for the loss, and the house of cards started to fall. Fans ripped apart coaches and players apart across social media and reporters were almost as brutal face to face with the players.
This is the curse of playing in the hockey capital of the world. Toronto is a ticking time bomb of criticism and backlash. Rarely a week goes by without another Phil Kessel dressing room party foul. The all-star power forward is continually asked about the team as a whole, and is bullied into a rising temper (try searching “Phil Kessel Media Scrums” and see for yourself). Captain Dion Phaneuf is called a pylon or a turtle in skates by media analysts in Toronto, while goalies’ wives are attacked on Twitter after a bad play or a soft goal. Do players and coaches really deserve to be treated like this? Imagine if every time you dropped a negative on an exam (our playoffs), you were slandered in front of the world. Players are people too.
Regardless of how we should treat sports icons, there are trends that emerge when athletes are exposed to more pressure. For some teams, it brings out the best. The Los Angeles Kings entered the 2014 Stanley Cup Playoffs as the 8th seed in the conference, won 3 series in game seven victories and won the Cup. Backs against the wall, the Kings are able to perform their best. The trend in Toronto seems to be that the media and fan pressure causes the players to underperform. Players’ Corsi numbers (an advanced statistic used to measure shot attempts, and that roughly translates as a metric of puck possession) drop as soon as they first put on a Leafs jersey. Players traded away begin to play better almost immediately.
This pressure would almost certainly ease if Toronto could put together a decent playoff run, so why not just sign some great talent and make a run for it? This is the strategy that Leafs’ GMs have tried for years now. Just patch the ship and she’ll make it through. Well, the ship has sunk. Toronto has been able to sneak into the playoffs just once in the ten years since the NHL lockout. Before this season even began, the Leafs’ appointed Brendan Shanahan, former NHL all-star and 3 time cup winner with the Red Wings (GO RED WINGS!), President of Hockey Operations. Shanahan has let the ship sink, and has begun to build another. He is opting for the “scorched earth” rebuilding policy and has stated that his future plans do not include his current stars, Phaneuf and Kessel. Under Shanahan, I’m sure the Leafs will see more success in the future.
On January 6th, following a 5-2 loss to the Jets, Randy Carlyle was fired. The team then went 13 games earning only 3 points. The tanking had begun. Key players began to be traded away for prospects and draft picks; building blocks. The team imploded under the interm head coach. Fans pray for the team to lose more and more often so that they can get the first pick in this year’s draft and pick a young all-star. We’ve heard this song many times before. “The Leafs have been eliminated from the playoffs at this point, so they should just give up.” You can’t ask a professional athlete to lose, though. It’s just not in their blood. The constant media pressure in Toronto has a definite impact on the players who can’t handle it (Phil Kessel). Don’t fret, Leafs Nation, there’s always next year!
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