Editor In Leaf
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Toronto Maple Leafs: Injury Luck Is Not a Coincidence.

By Andrew Cheng

TORONTO, ON - APRIL 08: Toronto Maple Leafs Goalie Frederik Andersen (31) reacts after an injury during the second period of the NHL regular season game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Pittsburgh Penguins on April 8, 2017, at Air Canada Centre in Toronto, ON, Canada. (Photograph by Julian Avram/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
TORONTO, ON - APRIL 08: Toronto Maple Leafs Goalie Frederik Andersen (31) reacts after an injury during the second period of the NHL regular season game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Pittsburgh Penguins on April 8, 2017, at Air Canada Centre in Toronto, ON, Canada. (Photograph by Julian Avram/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) /
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One of the main reasons the Toronto Maple Leafs made the playoffs last year was due to their lack of injuries. Was this just good luck?

Many people are commenting on the fact that the Toronto Maple Leafs made the playoffs simply because they were spared by injuries. They had no major injuries to their core players, unlike the Tampa Bay Lightning who had their superstar Steven Stamkos go down for quite a lengthy time. While luck still has a lot of influence on injuries, it can be argued that it wasn’t all luck for the Leafs. Let’s look at some more factors that helped the Leafs avoid injuries.

Medical Staff

The Toronto Maple Leafs have an abundance of money. Like, seriously, a lot of money. A lot of their money is spent on scouting and scouring the world for good prospects.

But another area their budget is spent on is their state-of-the-art medical team. The Leafs are making an abundance of money, unlike some other NHL teams. They can hire the world’s best doctors and have extremely up to date equipment that can keep the Maple Leafs healthy.

The Leafs have oodles of money spent on keeping their team healthy. And when they do get injured, they get treated better than other teams in the league. This investment pays back though, with very healthy Leafs and short injury times.

Historically Healthy

The Leafs seem to acquire very healthy players in the first place. In fact, they added Patrick Marleau to the team, who has not missed a game in eight years! Even Morgan Rielly has only had 16 games off in four years. The Toronto Maple Leafs don’t target injury prone players when trading, and they seem to be playing a cleaner game. Obviously if you play more rough hockey, you’re going to get injured more.

It could be argued that it’s not biological that they’re healthy, it’s just luck that they haven’t had an awkward fall or bad blocked shot. Although this does contribute a lot, some players just genetically have faster healing times. And as previously mentioned, steering clear of the danger will improve your odds a lot.

More from Editor In Leaf

Don’t worry about an injury ridden 17-18 season.

I mean, why would you? The Leafs are a young team, full of players with little to no injury history.  They have zero injury prone players and the best indication of future performance is past performance – and what happened in the past?  A healthy season!!

The Toronto maple Leafs won’t collapse in the next season due to extensive injuries. I mean, they could – luck still is a contributing factor, but the Leafs have lower odds due to the youth of their team and their crack medical staff.

Next: Leafs Pre Season Schedule

Rest assured the Toronto Maple Leafs will probably not miss the playoffs due to injuries. But, no promises.

Inspired by a post on Reddit from the Leafs subreddit.

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