The Leafs Management vs NHL

[herman]

http://espn.go.com/nhl/story/_/id/13789503/nhl-toronto-maple-leafs-gm-lou-lamoriello-talks-transition-new-jersey

LeBrun: You are turning 73 later this month [Oct. 21]. My mother-in-law is 73 and she has a place in Florida where she enjoys her retirement. So the question is: Why? Why would you want this incredible challenge, which comes with all that pressure, at this point in your life?

Lamoriello: I think it's a great question. My family asked me the same question, from my immediate family to my brother and my sister. But I think it's my makeup, that's my personality. And also the people involved, it wasn't something that I was thinking of or looking for. ... When Brendan [Shanahan] spoke to me about it, it was intriguing. After so many conversations, it became a challenge. The most important thing is your health, how do you feel? And the last five years certainly in New Jersey have been nothing but a roller coaster because of a lot of different things. I take full responsibility, but there are a lot of things that were not on the surface that you did for the better of the organization. I thought that this would be something that I would enjoy, because I love the game. And the challenge of having success, that's what you do, you compete against yourself. Toronto, what better place? What better hockey mecca? I've always been of the opinion -- and I have to be careful how this comes out -- but I always thought Toronto should be the Yankees of the National Hockey League.

Hence the facial hair guidelines, I guess.

 

[Kin]

I don't want to cheer for the Yankees. If I wanted to cheer for "The Yankees of the NHL" I'd be cheering for the Canadiens.

You don't get to just invent a tradition for a 100 year old organization. You respect its existing tradition.

 

[Frank E]

I don't want to cheer for the Yankees. If I wanted to cheer for "The Yankees of the NHL" I'd be cheering for the Canadiens.

You don't get to just invent a tradition for a 100 year old organization. You respect its existing tradition.

OK, I'll bite...the Canadiens are like the Yankees in that everyone hates their fans?

 

[Kin]

I don't want to cheer for the Yankees. If I wanted to cheer for "The Yankees of the NHL" I'd be cheering for the Canadiens.

You don't get to just invent a tradition for a 100 year old organization. You respect its existing tradition.

OK, I'll bite...the Canadiens are like the Yankees in that everyone hates their fans?

Well, I suppose the key similarity would be their respective success.

 

[Frank E]

I don't want to cheer for the Yankees. If I wanted to cheer for "The Yankees of the NHL" I'd be cheering for the Canadiens.

You don't get to just invent a tradition for a 100 year old organization. You respect its existing tradition.

OK, I'll bite...the Canadiens are like the Yankees in that everyone hates their fans?

Well, I suppose the key similarity would be their respective success.

I like mine better.  I don't much like yours. 

 

[Kin]

I like mine better.  I don't much like yours.

I like to think of ours going hand in hand.

 

[bustaheims]

I don't want to cheer for the Yankees. If I wanted to cheer for "The Yankees of the NHL" I'd be cheering for the Canadiens.

You don't get to just invent a tradition for a 100 year old organization. You respect its existing tradition.

Yeah. The Leafs are much more like the Red Sox. Now, what we need is our own pack of idiots to go out and win some championships!

 

[Kin]

I don't want to cheer for the Yankees. If I wanted to cheer for "The Yankees of the NHL" I'd be cheering for the Canadiens.

You don't get to just invent a tradition for a 100 year old organization. You respect its existing tradition.

Yeah. The Leafs are much more like the Red Sox. Now, what we need is our own pack of idiots to go out and win some championships!

A long championship drought created in part by previous ownership's bigotry, uncomfortable relationship between team ownership and the media that should be covering them, a great player in the 40's and 50's named Theodore...yup. We're the Red Sox.

 

[L K]

Admittedly, I'm not too concerned about mustaches and flying Bowens, but it appeared to me as though the Dubas-Hunter team wasn't having any particular troubles.

Just to clear it up, I don't think that individually any of these issues represent something that is in and of itself important but rather that it's the inflexibility and lack of open-mindedness they represent. What was great about the Dubas-Hunter(and Babcock, while we're at it) era is that they consistently said things that were smart. That made sense. Things like saying that the best way to alleviate media pressure is for the team to be good or the emphasis on speed and skill.

Now we're hearing a lot of the exact same "culture change" stuff we heard with Burke and seemingly reasonable people are bending over backwards to explain why facial hair or no broadcasters on team flights have anything in the way of logic behind them.

To be fair, I've had facial hair for years.  I recently shaved and now I feel like I'm more of a team player at work.  I wasn't before.  I'm pretty sure Lou is just a fan of Dan Harmon/Community and is trying to get the Leafs out of the Darkest Timeline.

 

[jonlleafs]

I'm cool with no media on the plane. It's just another distraction they don't need.  They are free to discuss stuff like strategy on the plane if needed.  Or the players have to constantly watch what they are saying in front of the media.  It makes no difference if they fly separately other than cost. So why not.

 

[herman]

To be fair, I've had facial hair for years.  I recently shaved and now I feel like I'm more of a team player at work.  I wasn't before.  I'm pretty sure Lou is just a fan of Dan Harmon/Community and is trying to get the Leafs out of the Darkest Timeline.

 

[Kin]

I'm cool with no media on the plane. It's just another distraction they don't need.  They are free to discuss stuff like strategy on the plane if needed.  Or the players have to constantly watch what they are saying in front of the media.

Again, it's team broadcasters, not "the media". We're talking about people who are MLSE employees.

 

[Kin]

To be fair, I've had facial hair for years.  I recently shaved and now I feel like I'm more of a team player at work.  I wasn't before.  I'm pretty sure Lou is just a fan of Dan Harmon/Community and is trying to get the Leafs out of the Darkest Timeline.

See, whereas I have ample evidence that I'm a jerk with or without a beard.

 

[herman]

I heard that Kyle Dubas will be speaking to the Leafs Lunch crew tomorrow at 12:30 (TSN 1050).

 

[Highlander]

Looked like Komrade K was sporting his Fu Man Chu sort of last night. Perhaps they have relaxed the rules. If not Kadri will probably have to shave 4 or 5 times a day

 

[herman]

http://www.tsn.ca/radio/toronto-1050/dubas-nylander-leivo-impressing-for-marlies-1.389268

Transcript in the Marlies section, as the conversation is strictly Marlie-talk: http://www.tmlfans.ca/community/index.php?topic=3318.msg241718#msg241718

 

[herman]

Brendan Shanahan on TSN 1050 with Dave Naylor.
https://mapleleafshotstove.com/2015/11/10/brendan-shanahan-ive-been-proud-of-this-team/

We know last season was a really tough one for the Maple Leafs. And yet, in the win-loss column this year, this one has been equally as difficult. I?d like to hear what you?re seeing on the ice night after night in terms of the team?s overall performance.
Shanahan: I think that we really prepared ourselves and prepared our fans and prepared our owners and prepared everybody for what had to happen here in order for us to make what we felt were the right steps necessary to not just have a team that can?t contend for the cup, but a team that, once you arrive in that contention category, could sustain it over a number of years. I?ve been really pleased. The competitive side of you, when you go out to play every game, you want to win. But not just how many guys have taken to coach Babcock?s philosophy, but the right guys have. The guys we were maybe a little bit concerned [about] ? we really need this guy to step up, and this guy to buy in. I?ve been proud of this team. We haven?t won as many games as we may have deserved, but you go into Montreal and you lose by a goal, and you throw 52 shots on net on, at the time, the hottest team in the NHL. You compare our record with the record we had last year at this time ? we had a winning record at this time. But I didn?t see a light at the end of the tunnel. I see one now. I like the way our prospects are playing, but I really like the way our guys are playing and the foundation Mike is laying.

Last season, before Mike Babcock and Lou Lamoriello got here, you made a very concerted effort to let the market here know what you were doing, what the plan was, and how long it was going to take. Why did you do all that? We haven?t seen that in this city. Not just the fact that you were doing it, but you went to such extent to explain it to the market and the fans here.
Shanahan: I think during the season that it wasn?t really appropriate to say certain things that I felt. Not to say I wasn?t saying them to people internally, to people within the organization. Everyone?s got a boss. I?ve got a board. Explaining it to them what we need to do to really become what the Toronto Maple Leafs deserve to be. When the season ended, I addressed the media and the fans. I don?t think I did anything except be as honest as I could be. I pulled no punches. I?m respectful person; I try to be to as many individuals as I can. I walked away from that press conference at the end of the season and people were saying that was refreshing. I just told the truth. I think that we?ve got a sophisticated market of media, of fans. I don?t think anybody here wants us to lose. I don?t buy the excuses I?ve heard in the past that it?s too hard to play here or the media is happier when we?re losing because it?s better for the news and better for ratings. I just thought they were all excuses. Doesn?t mean it?s easy to do, but like I said I just spoke from the heart and I just spoke as honestly as I could.

You?ve always believed in the notion of possibility in this market, but why did you believe in it?
Shanahan: I guess I just have the mindset that, if you show me one mountain and ask me to climb it, but before you do you point to another one and say it?s bigger, I want to go climb that one. That?s sort of the same philosophy I went after Mike Babcock [with] and I was one of the few people who thought he would come here to Toronto. Same with Lou Lamoriello. Same with Mark Hunter. Kyle Dubas. Run down the list of the guys we?ve brought in over the last year and a half, and they were all very comfortable and had safe and secure situations, but they all saw the potential of what we could be. Having grown up here, having grown up a Maple Leaf fan my whole life and never really considered cheering for another team as a kid, but also recognizing where some of the warts were and some of the frustrations were, I just saw the Toronto Maple Leafs as a tremendous place for potential. With a lot of hard work and some breaks, we plan to get there.

 

[herman]

http://www.sportsnet.ca/hockey/nhl/lou-lamoriello-toronto-maple-leafs-plan-marlies-culture-nylander-marner-kyle-dubas-mark-hunter-brendan-shanahan/

Even as a crop of 2014 and 2015 first-rounders ? Dylan Larkin, Connor McDavid, Jack Eichel, Nikolaj Ehlers ? prove nightly that, yes, teenagers can contribute at the NHL level, the rebuilding Leafs resist the allure of a youthful injection of offence, anemic two-goals-a-game average be damned.

?Temptations are everything in life,? admitted general manager Lou Lamoriello, during an appearance with Gord Stellick and Todd Hlushko on Sportsnet 590 The Fan.

"You have to be careful: Is this the right thing for the big picture?"

So, if scoring goals and winning a few NHL games isn't the right thing, what is?

The Maple Leafs' plan, Lamoriello explained, places no value on instant, temporary success. Rather, the goal is to build a foundation for both team and individual achievement that is sustainable for years.

Though Lamoriello said internal discussions on prospects are held daily between him, president Brendan Shanahan, assistant general manager Kyle Dubas, director of player personnel Mark Hunter, assistant to the GM Brendan Pridham, and coach Mike Babcock, the organization must be certain talents like Nylander and Marner enter a dressing room that won't cause them to regress.

Despite being hired into a previously established front office by Shanahan, a former employee of his own, Lamoriello has quickly realized that Shanahan's group is comprised of men he would've hired himself.

"Mark Hunter is just a superstar in what he does and just a pleasure to be around as far as his honesty," Lamoriello said. Then he heaped another spoonful of praise on the "extremely intelligent" Dubas.

As for the players, the first step is to discover which ones on the current big-club roster want to be part of the reformed Maple Leafs culture. Who is willing to "pay the price" to compete for a Stanley Cup?

Once management discovers who's buying in, decisions on individual players will be made.

"Then the young prospect that you have, you feel comfortable about bringing them into an environment that's going to allow them to progress and move and not be drawn in different directions," Lamoriello explained.

"Once you get that room straightened out and you get that work ethic, you get that system orientated, you get that logo on the front of the jersey is what matters, not the name [on the back], then we'll know more about where we're going."

 

[WhatIfGodWasALeaf]

To add to the link you posted, Nylander now at 19(8g/11a/1.36PPG) in 14 and Marner is at 32(11g/21a/2PPG) in 16.

 

[herman]

Part I: Brendan Shanahan Gets "Puck Possessed"
Part II: Reversing the Curse
Part III: Shanny Listens to his Leaf Gut
Part IV: Nylander, Kapanen and Shanny?s Fancy Foreign Friends
Part V: Shanahan and Soshnikov - the Kid Who's Scared of Nothing

This is a series of analyses from the guy that wrote the Timashov article on our Management team's influences over their careers (specifically Shanahan) and how it has changed the direction of the Toronto Maple Leafs from the past 40+ years.

It's not my favourite writing style, but the point is clear and really fun to read about.