2018-19 Toronto Maple Leafs - General Discussion

[CarltonTheBear]

From what I can tell the Leafs now have the Soo's GM (Dubas), head coach (Keefe), director of player development (Clark), director of player personnel (Carneiro), and central Ontario area scout (Roque).

There's also talk that they might be hiring Jon Elkin for the Marlies goalie coach gig. Elkin (surprise, surprise) worked with Dubas and Keefe in the Soo and was recently let go by the Coyotes.

 

[Zee]

Very interesting group there. Two females: everyone knows Wickenheiser of course, Needham is more of an unknown name but it looks like she owns a hockey school called Legend Hockey that does a lot of NCAA stuff.

Vic Carneiro has a Dubas-connection as he worked with him in Sault Ste. Marie. Dubas promoted him to the role of Director of Player Personnel there after inheriting him as a scout. He's been an OHL scout since 1999, first working with the London Knights right when the Hunter's bought the team.

Leafs being progressive, not sure how many women are employed in these types of positions at the NHL level, can't be many.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

The Leafs now have 5 pro scouts, 16 amateur scouts, a head amateur scout, directors of amateur/pro/European scouting, and a senior director that oversees the entire scouting staff. Gotta think that's the biggest and most expensive scouting staff in the league. Time will tell if it's also among the best.

 

[Zee]

The Leafs now have 5 pro scouts, 16 amateur scouts, a head amateur scout, directors of amateur/pro/European scouting, and a senior director that oversees the entire scouting staff. Gotta think that's the biggest and most expensive scouting staff in the league. Time will tell if it's also among the best.

Love it.  They can't go over the salary cap on actual players but they can spend whatever they want on everything else.  Might as well try and have the best scouting staff possible, if that means hiring everyone so be it.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

The Leafs now have 5 pro scouts, 16 amateur scouts, a head amateur scout, directors of amateur/pro/European scouting, and a senior director that oversees the entire scouting staff. Gotta think that's the biggest and most expensive scouting staff in the league. Time will tell if it's also among the best.

Decided to compare this to the other Canadian teams, just for kicks. In total the Leafs have 26 people listed on their scouting staff.

Winnipeg: 20
Vancouver: 19
Montreal: 18
Calgary: 17
Edmonton: 13
Ottawa: 13

Since some of the teams include pictures in their directories this was also a fun exercise in seeing how many old white guys are employed by them, particularly in a scouting role. The Leafs hiring a couple of females doesn't really change this entirely but it is a nice start.

Like sorry Vancouver but these are all the same person:

 

[CarltonTheBear]

https://twitter.com/TLNdc/status/1032640625504473088

I very much doubt that this would ever happen, but honestly reading through the article it does make a fair bit of sense. Especially considering the make-up of our team.

I'm sure there were people who thought that playing 4 forwards on the powerplay was bonkers too 10 years ago, but all it took was for one team to start having success with it and it's almost universally adopted now.

 

[CarltonTheBear]

https://twitter.com/MatiszJohn/status/1032665220328710144

 

[herman]

https://twitter.com/MatiszJohn/status/1032665220328710144

Whatup

@Achayria, former writer for PPP and editor/writer for Raw Charge pointed out that one of the biggest inefficiencies with a lot of untapped potential to take advantage of would be hiring women to NHL management.

 

[Zee]

https://twitter.com/MatiszJohn/status/1032665220328710144

Would it be weird as a happily married man to admit I have a slight man-crush on Dubas?

 

[herman]

Would it be weird as a happily married man to admit I have a slight man-crush on Dubas?

Get in line, buddy.

 

[Kin]

I think that what Dubas is saying here is fundamentally true in most respects and he should be commended for making a push towards broadening the scope of hockey hirings while still attracting top quality people.

That said, I am curious to see if applying the broader truths here to a pretty narrowly focused business like the NHL will end up as a perfect fit. If you're running an operation where creativity allows for new areas/goals to pursue than you would obviously want as diverse and open-minded a staff as possible. In a world as singularly driven and rigidly structured as running a NHL team I have to think those benefits are somewhat more limited.

 

[Phileas Fogg]

I think that what Dubas is saying here is fundamentally true in most respects and he should be commended for making a push towards broadening the scope of hockey hirings while still attracting top quality people.

That said, I am curious to see if applying the broader truths here to a pretty narrowly focused business like the NHL will end up as a perfect fit. If you're running an operation where creativity allows for new areas/goals to pursue than you would obviously want as diverse and open-minded a staff as possible. In a world as singularly driven and rigidly structured as running a NHL team I have to think those benefits are somewhat more limited.

If I'm understanding your point, I'd like to think that there's enough new blood in the NHL front offices that there will be no issues with working with people outside of the sport's traditional background/makeup, particularly if there's the consensus that the hiring is considered merit based.  I'd be suprised if others in the industry saw it as a Trudeau-style virtue signal appointment.

 

[cabber24]

https://twitter.com/TLNdc/status/1032640625504473088

I very much doubt that this would ever happen, but honestly reading through the article it does make a fair bit of sense. Especially considering the make-up of our team.

I'm sure there were people who thought that playing 4 forwards on the powerplay was bonkers too 10 years ago, but all it took was for one team to start having success with it and it's almost universally adopted now.

On this team, how about one defenseman all the time except the penalty kill? All killer no filler.

Three sets of 4 forwards and cycle Gardiner, Rielly and Dermott. Instead of having a 4th line that rarely plays you have crappy d-man that rarely play. By the way, I am not a big fan of our D.  We would have scores like 8-4, 10-7... it would be awesome.

Kappi/Levio/Ennis or Zaitsev/Carrick/Hainsey on the bench? The more talented group to me looks obvious.

Hell, Scott Bowman tried it with Federov.

 

[Kin]

If I'm understanding your point, I'd like to think that there's enough new blood in the NHL front offices that there will be no issues with working with people outside of the sport's traditional background/makeup, particularly if there's the consensus that the hiring is considered merit based.  I'd be suprised if others in the industry saw it as a Trudeau-style virtue signal appointment.

No, that's not really what I meant. What I was getting at, I suppose, is that if you're running a business like Google or Amazon or whatever there are lots of avenues towards success if success is ultimately determined by something like profits or share value. As a result creative thinking can not only open up new paths to success in existing ventures but also entirely new ventures where you're really only restricted by a fairly loose regulatory system. To me, that presents a very clear and straightforward reason to not only have strong voices but, as Dubas mentions, diverse voices as well.

Hockey is a very different animal. In the NHL we unfortunately tend to think of success as a sort of binary question where there is one success every year and then 30 various degrees of failure. All the bright, outside of the box thinking won't open up new avenues for the team to pursue and the paths towards that one mode of success are rigidly restricted by a CBA that regulates just about anything a team can do in a direct capacity.

Like I said, I don't think any of these hires are bad ideas or will hurt the team or be received negatively but I'm a little sceptical that you can apply most standard organizational theories to something as specialized and restricted as a hockey team. I'm not arguing for regressive thinking or only giving jobs to grizzled hockey lifers, just that my experiences as a fan in other sports have led me to believe that a lot of the fancy new ways of thinking that get highly touted often just end up reinforcing existing beliefs and the actual impact of expanding like this is fairly minimal.

That said, I hope I'm wrong. I'd very much like to see the scope of hockey hiring open up and the Leafs use their strong position to maximize whatever benefit they can from it.

 

[Highlander]

The Leafs now have 5 pro scouts, 16 amateur scouts, a head amateur scout, directors of amateur/pro/European scouting, and a senior director that oversees the entire scouting staff. Gotta think that's the biggest and most expensive scouting staff in the league. Time will tell if it's also among the best.

Decided to compare this to the other Canadian teams, just for kicks. In total the Leafs have 26 people listed on their scouting staff.

Winnipeg: 20
Vancouver: 19
Montreal: 18
Calgary: 17
Edmonton: 13
Ottawa: 13

Since some of the teams include pictures in their directories this was also a fun exercise in seeing how many old white guys are employed by them, particularly in a scouting role. The Leafs hiring a couple of females doesn't really change this entirely but it is a nice start.

Like sorry Vancouver but these are all the same person:

Hammerstrom not looking bad for his age, remember his scoring an overtime goal against Boston in the playoffs a lifetime ago.

 

[Highlander]

Would it be weird as a happily married man to admit I have a slight man-crush on Dubas?

Get in line, buddy.

It the Clark Kent glass's

 

[lamajama]

Off current topic but the new Sportsnet play by play guy for the Leafs games...it's not the Marlies guy is it?

I hope not...not a fan of his goal calls......

 

[Guru Tugginmypuddah]

The Leafs now have 5 pro scouts, 16 amateur scouts, a head amateur scout, directors of amateur/pro/European scouting, and a senior director that oversees the entire scouting staff. Gotta think that's the biggest and most expensive scouting staff in the league. Time will tell if it's also among the best.

Decided to compare this to the other Canadian teams, just for kicks. In total the Leafs have 26 people listed on their scouting staff.

Winnipeg: 20
Vancouver: 19
Montreal: 18
Calgary: 17
Edmonton: 13
Ottawa: 13

Since some of the teams include pictures in their directories this was also a fun exercise in seeing how many old white guys are employed by them, particularly in a scouting role. The Leafs hiring a couple of females doesn't really change this entirely but it is a nice start.

Like sorry Vancouver but these are all the same person:

Hammerstrom not looking bad for his age, remember his scoring an overtime goal against Boston in the playoffs a lifetime ago.

And could go in the corner with a dozen eggs in his pocket and not break one of them.

 

[hockeyfan1]

The Leafs now have 5 pro scouts, 16 amateur scouts, a head amateur scout, directors of amateur/pro/European scouting, and a senior director that oversees the entire scouting staff. Gotta think that's the biggest and most expensive scouting staff in the league. Time will tell if it's also among the best.

Decided to compare this to the other Canadian teams, just for kicks. In total the Leafs have 26 people listed on their scouting staff.

Winnipeg: 20
Vancouver: 19
Montreal: 18
Calgary: 17
Edmonton: 13
Ottawa: 13

Since some of the teams include pictures in their directories this was also a fun exercise in seeing how many old white guys are employed by them, particularly in a scouting role. The Leafs hiring a couple of females doesn't really change this entirely but it is a nice start.

Like sorry Vancouver but these are all the same person:

Hammerstrom not looking bad for his age, remember his scoring an overtime goal against Boston in the playoffs a lifetime ago.

And could go in the corner with a dozen eggs in his pocket and not break one of them.

Ah, Hammerstrom.  He was a deft puckhandler and superb skater but had a lot of trouble adjusting to the then violent and hard-hitting era of the NHL, which was the '70's (the Broad Street Bullies era).

Thanks to Hammerstrom & Salming plus the Leafs brass that introduced them to the NHL and thus paved the way for Swedish/Euro players to eventually follow.

Ballard was cruel with his description of Hammerstrom plus the "chicken Swede" label however warranted it may have seemed to some (not to all Leafs fans at the time.

Hammerstrom and Salming (who adapted and survived quite well in the hockey style of the times) were easily along my favourite Leafs -- Salming for his skills & endurance, and Hammerstrom for his courage (as a far more docile player than Borje) ijust to be on that ice.

 

[Guilt Trip]

Salming=Best Leaf D man ever.