The Toronto Maple Leafs have more Hockey Hall of Fame inductees than any other team.
The only problem: most of the Toronto Maple Leafs Hall of Famers are of an older vintage. For fans who have watched the team since the 80s, it won’t surprise you to learn that there aren’t many players that we’ve watched in the Hall as members of the Leafs.
Darryl Sittler was inducted in 1989, but I never got to see him play.
Lanny MacDonald in 1992, and his mustache was inducted separately in 1994, but I only ever saw them play for the Flames.
The first Toronto Maple Leafs player I ever watched who went to the HOF was Borje Salming, but my memories of him are from the very late eighties.
Mike Gartner, Brian Leetch, Glen Anderson, Ed Belfour, Phil Housley, Eric Lindros, Joe Niuwendyk and Larry Murphy are in the Hall, but not for things they did in a Leafs jersey.
We’ll still take it.
Two Leafs Deserved to Go
It wasn’t until 2011 and 2012, when Mats Sundin and Doug Gilmour were inducted, that anyone born in the early eighties actually got to see players we remember watching go into the Hall of Fame primarily for things they did as Leafs.
We later saw Dave Andreychuck go into the Hall, partly at least, as a Leaf.
But that is it.
This year the Hall of Fame voters demonstrated extremely poor judgement by ignoring Alex Mogilny, who although he doesn’t warrant selection for his three seasons in Toronto, is regardless a no-doubt Hall of Fame player.
Alex Mogilny is just short of 500 goals.
He played the majority of his career during the Dead Puck Era and yet he’s over a point-per-game player. For nearly 1000 games. He has 1032 career points, 39 playoff goals, and a Stanley Cup.
He also once scored 76 goals.
And he is among the most influential hockey players of all time, as his 1989 deflection opened up the floodgates for Russians playing in the NHL. There is a documentary about this and you should watch it.
Anyways, Alex Mogilny is a rock-solid, no-doubt, Hall of Famer. He might not go in as a member of the Leafs, but he should be in there regardless.
No offense to Sergei Zubov or Guy Carboneau, but those are terrible selections.
Mogilny is far more deserving.
And, I would be remiss if I didn’t end this by mentioning one other member of the Toronto Maple Leafs who is deserving of Hall of Fame hounours and who never gets mentioned: Tomas Kaberle.
He played nearly a 1000 games, he averaged over 40 points per season, was generally amazing and played in a low scoring era. He’s one of the best all-time players of an original six team.
He should be in.