Toronto Maple Leafs: Dear New York Islanders Fans
I’ll preface what’s to come by noting that I’ve been a fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs for all 22 of my years on this earth.
You want to talk about pain? No one knows pain better than us. For the Leafs’ faithful, it’s is a baseline emotion. Really, if any fanbase is qualified to hit you with the ol’ “I know that feel, bro”, it’s this one.
So, with that out of the way, let’s continue.
Dear Islanders Fans,
You’re angry. Honestly, you have every right to be. Considering the hell you just endured, a cathartic release is more than called for.
Although, let me make one suggestion. Rather than spitting venom directly at your former captain, turn that hatred towards the group truly responsible for this mess. Make it rain over the ones who deserve of it.
I say this because, ironically, the one person who managed to duck guilt from the John Tavares sweepstakes is John Tavares himself.
Yes, his name may be plastered on the back of a flammable jersey an arms reach away. But he’s not the culprit here. He doesn’t deserve this.
They do.
Ownership
We live in a world where NHL superstars rarely, if ever, leave their draft team as free agents.
In most cases, ownership locks their cornerstones into lucrative extensions so far in advance that they never even sniff free agency. The evidence is all around us. Even in the midst of #TavaresWatch, stars like Drew Doughty and Logan Couture took that exact path, re-upping with their respective teams for long-term deals a full calendar year before their initial contracts expired.
This makes Tavares’ decision even more notable.
An individual of such notorious loyalty doesn’t buck tradition like this for no reason. Rather, Tavares’ decision to leave Long Island confirms that something within the organization he called home for close to a decade is fundamentally wrong. Something drove him out.
It wasn’t money. He would have made significantly more from a return to the Islanders than signing with the Leafs. Nor was it term. Lou Lamoriello & co. could offer him an 8th year, a luxury no other team in the negotiation process was afforded with.
You see, Tavares isn’t responsible for the arena debacle. He didn’t create a situation which forced Islanders fans into needing to look up which of their two home arenas their supposedly professional sports team would play in on that given night.
Ownership did that.
It wasn’t Tavares who agreed on temporarily calling an arena with immediate and glaring sightline issues home. An arena where the infrastructure left large portions of the ice surface obstructed to a percentage of the playing public. Then, to quell the inevitable outcry, it wasn’t Tavares who released a statement urging fans in obstructed seats to remedy the situation by streaming the game on their phone. You know, while attending the game they paid to see.
No, ownership did that.
It certainly Tavares’ lack of foresight that failed to predict the obvious logistical issues that inevitably come with retrofitting an arena that was built only for basketball into an ice rink. Issues which eventually culminated in the worst ice quality of the modern NHL era. Breeding conditions so poor, games were practically unplayable.
Guess who did that? Ownership.
Islanders ownership drove a once-dynastic franchise into hockey’s gutter. Not Tavares. All he did was pledge 9 years of his playing career to a team incapable of building a contender around him.
And speaking of team building…
Management
Behold the true guilty party, Islanders fans.
For most of his tenure as GM, Garth Snow found himself blessed with the most precious gift any front office can have; a bonafide superstar. Hired in the summer of 2006, Snow oversaw three miserable seasons on The Island before landing the draft’s top pick in 2009. Obviously, that pick became Tavares.
The rest should have been history.
Over the following nine seasons, Snow proceeded to accomplish nothing other than wasting a significant percentage of his stars’ prime. Not only that, he managed this despite said star being locked into arguably the most team-friendly deal in the entire league.
You see, the expected payday for Toronto’s young stars is the biggest hurdle Kyle Dubas will cross in maintaining a contender. Auston Matthews is a lock to command upwards of $11 million per on his next deal, making the act of surrounding him with supporting pieces down the road significantly more difficult.
It can be done. Albeit with a competent management group.
In Snow’s case, he already had 9 years of his cornerstone locked in at half of that. Building a contender should have been easy. Not to mention, the cap has only inflated since. An occurrence which made Tavares’ $5.5 million AAV – comparable to Matt Moulson, David Clarkson and Milan Lucic – look better each year.
And yet, nothing.
Speaking of Moulson, he’s just the beginning. Snow seemed to establish a habit of repeatedly and inexplicably committing to players of Moulson’s ilk as suitable compliments to his superstar.
Rather than wielding the cap savings afforded to him by Tavares’ deal to lure marquee talent, Snow perused the bargain bin instead. A decision which eventually cost the franchise its beating heart.
Even when Snow lucked into high-end talent, he drove it away.
It wasn’t Tavares who mired Nino Niederreiter – a now perennial 25-goal scorer – in a toxic situation which left the 5th overall pick feeling unwanted by those who drafted him. And it wasn’t Tavares who traded him straight up for Cal Clutterbuck soon after either.
I could give a laundry list of similar moves, but I think you know them all better than I do anyway.
Changes
Ah, yes. The desperate pleading to stay.
It’s clear that hiring Lou Lamoriello and Barry Trotz as GM and coach of the Islanders was a hail mary move done to recoup Tavares. These men exude a championship pedigree coupled with an air of respect. Both are qualities of immense need for a floundering organization.
Unfortunately, it’s a lesson in too little, too late.
Let’s say you somehow managed to luck into dating a person miles out of your league. Great, right? Not so fast. Having locked them down, you proceed to, over your relationship’s following nine 9 years: refuse to buy them nice things, hastily move them into terrible living quarters all around the city, and drive away the bulk of their promising friendships.
Through it all, your significant other, who’s actually doing you a favour by even dating you in the first place, remains as loyal and supportive as the day you first met.
Then, after nine years of enduring undeserved treatment, your partner announces their intention to leave you. Oh no! Scrambling to avoid the fear of being alone, you don’t, I don’t know, buy them nice things and solidify your living situation. Things, by the way, you should have done roughly nine years ago.
No, you instead bring in two people who your significant other has never met before, crossing your fingers they’ll convince them to stay.
Relationships don’t work that way. Sorry.
All Tavares did was gift you with nearly a decade of superstar-level production, in his prime, at a fraction of his worth. As captain, he led by example, never even approaching the label of “problem in the room”. Instead, he made himself easy to play with while maintaining constant activity in the local community as the franchise’s noble face.
John Tavares was everything both the Islanders and their fans could have wanted in a player.
So, the pain inflicted by his departure on Sunday is warranted. And feeling it without reservation is perfectly acceptable.
What’s not acceptable is blaming him for choosing to leave the organization who never gave him a reason to stay.
Next: With John Tavares, A New Era Begins
Thanks for reading!