Toronto Maple Leafs president Brendan Shanahan speaks during a media conference in Toronto on May 21.Dan Hamilton/Reuters
Back in the summer of 2016, Steven Stamkos went on a listening tour of the NHL. Mostly, he was listening to the sound of gym bags full of money being dropped on conference tables.
One of his stops was Toronto, where he reportedly met the mayor as well as Maple Leafs’ executives. This campaign trip was not a secret. Word of it leaked everywhere. Hours before free agency kicked off, Stamkos re-signed with Tampa.
This summer, his deal ended. There was no listening tour. Stamkos, 34, had to wait on Tampa’s decision.
It was assumed Stamkos was owed one more contract for winning two Stanley Cups. Tampa gave his money to Jake Guentzel instead.
Stamkos ate the insult, as well as a pay cut, and signed with the Nashville Predators. Then he did a full day’s worth of passive-aggressive damage control.
“Fell short [with Tampa],” he told TSN. “Not by my trying, that’s for sure.”
Or “To have a team show as much interest as Nashville did … it’s just made us feel really, really special.”
Stamkos seemed unable to wrap his head around the idea that the Tampa Bay Lightning made a business decision rather than a friendship decision.
Going the latter way would have been easier for the Lightning. Not because Stamkos is so great any more, but because hockey loves stasis. Tampa would have been congratulated for showing loyalty, even though it wouldn’t have made it any better.
Instead, Tampa chose the harder route. Again, because it is a business.
At the same time, the Toronto Maple Leafs were proving they are not a business. They are a feudal state.
The goal here isn’t to grow or win or change in any way. It’s to continue in a tradition that has always worked: losing with honour.
During their annual ‘Goodbye and Thanks for All the Season Tickets’ presser in early May, the Leafs identified three interconnected problems in their latest playoff failure. They didn’t score enough goals; they were crap on the power play; and their goalies weren’t good enough.
They didn’t promise to switch up anything major, but they strongly hinted in that direction.
“There are times that you talk about patience,” team president Brendan Shanahan said then. “However, when you see patterns persist, and results don’t change, you have to adjust the way you think about things.”
There’s your marching order – goals, the PP, high-end goaltending, a shakeup. So the Leafs have spent the past week hiring midtier defencemen and backup netminders.
Everybody likes new Leaf Chris Tanev because he presents the ur-image of a hockey player. He’s even missing the correct teeth.
But Tanev is a human Range Rover – looks amazing, hope you enjoy looking at him hiked up on jacks at your mechanic’s. He’s about to turn 35 and if he plays a whole season, it will be a Lourdes-level miracle.
All the other newbies are roster filler. Nothing fundamental has changed about this club. It’s the same team with a few new nameplates.
All the talk about getting rid of Mitch Marner or John Tavares? That’s over. People don’t even bother mentioning it any more. They seem to have realized the far likelier prospect is that Marner strings the Leafs out until his free agency kicks in next summer and leaves for nothing.
How did Toronto get to this point? Two players in the NBA have blanket no-trade clauses. Five players on the Leafs have them. That’s how.
What this past week has reinforced is the Leafs’ deep understanding of their market.
The danger in Toronto isn’t losing. The danger is in changing your story. Toronto sports fans are like either end of the political spectrum – they want to be shined on, as long as the grift is consistent, so that they never have to ask themselves real questions or risk feeling stupid.
The story to tell in Toronto is one about consistency and slow progress. It’s about staying the course, even if the course keeps leading you off a steep incline. It’s about never aspiring too much, because that would be dangerous and, worse, foolish.
It works so well that every team in the city plays it the same way. It helps that they are all owned by the same people. No one ever gets the bright idea of zigging while everybody else zags.
Every spring and fall, the bile is drained. The team says they’ll be better, but doesn’t promise that. Nothing happens and they sell it as something. The fans do the hard work of convincing themselves that Chris Tanev or Justin Turner or Immanuel Quickley will change everything, though no one outside Toronto has ever thought that.
The stadiums and arenas are full. The merchandise is everywhere on the streets. If people wanted things to be different, they would be. But they don’t, so they aren’t.
What is Toronto? It’s a warm blanket of mediocrity enveloping a 24-hour-a-day traffic jam.
The Leafs don’t need to be better, and every summer we are reminded of that. What are you going to do? Become a Bruins’ fan? Get another coach fired? It doesn’t change anything.
This was the brilliance of giving all the high-end talent no-movement riders. It didn’t trap the team. It trapped the players. They’re all stuck here now, part of this Forever War on change.
Their part in the play is to get run out, do it all over again and take all the hits in the media. A hundred points in the regular season; get hammered in the first or second round. Then, when Marner leaves, it’s his fault the Leafs can’t get better.
You may or may not like the result, but face it – you love the consistency. The world is scary, but the Leafs don’t need to be. As life gets faster and more out of control, the Leafs stay exactly the same.