Toronto Maple Leafs: Marlies with the Most to Prove

If nothing else, the Toronto Maple Leafs are in for a scintillating training camp.

And not for the reasons you may think. Yes, there will certainly be plenty of intrigue surrounding line combinations and who wins the final third pairing defence spot, but it’s actually the Toronto Marlies who may feel the most impact.

Significant turnover is expected on Marlies’ roster, as many previously buried players will be given new opportunities to produce. For a select few, their futures within the organization hinge on how they respond.

Here are two notable Marlies who now enter make or break territory.

Adam Brooks

Thanks in equal part to his status as a recent draft pick and having the physical appearance of a high schooler, fans perceive Adam Brooks as a prospect wading through the early stages of his development.

Only, he may have less runway than most think.

Despite jumping into the AHL as a rookie less than 12 months ago, Brooks celebrated his 22nd birthday in May, placing him amongst the older prospects who occupy Toronto’s pipeline.

In slipping by unselected in both his draft and draft +1 years, the late bloomer had already ventured well past Canada’s legal drinking age when the Leafs ultimately took a flier on him in 2016.

So, Brooks joined the Marlies to begin 2017-18 and quickly found himself in need of making up for lost time. As the clock ticked louder with each passing day, he didn’t exactly burst out the gates.

In fact, game 23 is the first time Brooks successfully beat an AHL goaltender, a blip on his way to mustering just 7 points through his first 44 games.

Early reviews, as one would expect, were not kind.

On the ice, the Regina-native looked equal parts timid, uncomfortable and, frankly, out of his element at the professional level. And as the calendar flipped past January, serious questions surrounding where exactly Brooks’ future headed began to surface.

Just when it appeared hopeless, Brooks course corrected his nightmarish start, steadily improving as the season wore on. Kicking off in March, he incrementally redefined the previously ineffective aspects of his game through the schedule’s latter stretches and eventually earned a featured role in centring the Marlies’ fourth line during the postseason.

You know, the same fourth line that was a vital component to capturing a Calder Cup.

After an unimaginably putrid debut, Brooks stamped his rookie campaign with resounding success. Few prospects are capable of so dramatically altering their trajectories mid-season, which further paints what Brooks manage to accomplish in an impressive light.

And yet, the clock keeps ticking.

Brooks is rapidly approaching the age where prospect development reaches a plateau, painting the 2018-19 season as the most important of his young career. No longer a rookie, Brooks now stands at a crossroads.

Will he continue the positive steps taken from game 44 and beyond? Or is reverting back into the same nonconfrontational floater who was held goalless up until New Year’s Eve more in the cards? Only Brooks can answer those questions.

And how he does could very well determine his future as a Leaf.

Andreas Borgman

Andreas Borgman is not an AHLer. Or, that’s at least what he (and a collection of Twitter likes) appears to believe.

As to whether Leafs management shares that belief remains to be seen.

Forming an accurate evaluation of Borgman’s first NHL stint has its fair share of hurdles, particularly emerging in the form of a Roman Polak-sized variable. Simply treading water while adjusting to life on North American ice – on the fly, no less –  is a difficult enough undertaking for European free agents, let alone for a 22-year-old defenceman.

It’s a rocky process, requiring players to gain entirely new concepts of intrinsic skills like gap control and spatial awareness which differ from how they’ve previously functioned for the bulk of their lives.

Needless to say, the transition is jarring.

At its core, this is just a long-winded prologue to point out that pairing Borgman almost exclusively alongside one of the NHL’s worst regular contributors at the defence position probably wasn’t the best idea.

If you strap an anchor to the neck of a novice swimmer and toss them in the deep end, you can’t really blame them for drowning. And make no mistake, Polak is a heavy anchor.

The 32-year-old (how is he only 32?) logged a minimum of 50 minutes paired with 4 separate defence partners last season – Jake Gardiner, Morgan Rielly, Travis Dermott – who each saw their possession numbers spike upon separation. The final name of the bunch happens to be Borgman, whose 49.21% 5v5 CF/60 without Polak dwarfs the latter’s 46.79% in similar circumstances.

Then again, Borgman doesn’t entirely skirt blame here.

We can argue for days as to whether he deserved his mid-February demotion, but it won’t alter the fact that Borgman failed to use his time on the Marlies as a means of improvement. Sent to Ricoh with the orders of adding “penalty killer” to his resume’s notable skills repertoire, Borgman never looked comfortable in the AHL, a puzzling development considering he showed glimpses of promise at the level above.

Borgman wasn’t bad, per say. Rather, it’s his failure to thrive as a big fish in a small pond that lands him on this list. In an organization packed to the gills with capable depth options at LHD, Borgman’s window of opportunity rapidly narrows.

There’s also his postseason performance, or lack thereof, that didn’t exactly help his position on the depth chart either. After sustaining an injury in game one of the Marlies’ first-round series with Utica, the next time Borgman stepped foot on the ice was in June, only to hoist the Calder Cup.

Everything I’ve heard confirms that Borgman was indeed injured, at least initially. Although, whispers have since emerged suggesting that he, in fact, did become healthy enough to play as the postseason wore on and the coaching staff made the decision to hold Borgman out regardless.

Why? The answer may simply be that the Marlies didn’t actually need him.

Barring a superb training camp, Borgman will likely find himself beginning the year as a Marlie, presenting him with a prime opportunity to re-write his current narrative. 2018-19 being the final year of his deal only heightens the pressure.

The Leafs have seen only a glimpse of what Borgman can do in the NHL. He must now give them the full picture.

Thanks for reading!

Stats courtesy of hockeyreference.com