Toronto Maple Leafs: Mike Babcock Must Change His Ways

The Toronto Maple Leafs have made changes in the offseason. It now means Mike Babcock will have to adapt his coaching style.

Over his tenure with the Toronto Maple Leafs, head coach Mike Babcock has been a lightning rod for criticism. Having been eliminated in the first round for the third straight year, one could argue that this criticism has been just.

Thanks to the moves made by the general manager, Kyle Dubas, Babcock will be forced to adjust his style. The Maple Leafs have a new look to their roster due to the trades and signings that have taken place this offseason. The new personnel will force the coach’s hand to tweak his systems.

This will likely start with the penalty kill. That was the responsibility of the former assistant coach, D.J. Smith. His moving into the head coaching position for the Ottawa Senators should immediately create discernable differences in the way that the Leafs kill penalties this season.

Babcock has his idiosyncrasies as a coach and it may have affected the way that the team was constructed for this coming season. Dubas did not bring back one of his coach’s favourite players, Ron Hainsey. The defenceman not being offered a contract may be attributed to the Leafs effort to clear cap space or it could be an attempt to force Babcock’s hand.

Hainsey was regularly receiving the most playing time on the team. For a squad of youthful players, it may have seemed odd to the GM that a 37-year-old player (now 38) was seeing the most ice. Babcock appears to have always had a fondness for his veteran players, sometimes at the expense of his young stars. Might that explain why Dubas paid the price of a first-round draft pick to ship Patrick Marleau to the Carolina Hurricanes or was it just a cap related transaction?

Regardless of the motives behind any of Dubas’ offseason moves, it will mean change for the Maple Leafs. Since Connor Brown was included in the deal that sent he and Nikita Zaitsev to Ottawa in exchange for Cody Ceci and Ben Harpur, Babcock will look to rely on a new forward to act as a dependable two-way man. Brown, or “Brown Cow” as the coach liked to call him, was often tasked with shutting down his opponents, especially at critical moments to finish games. Babcock no longer has that luxury.

More importantly, the change among players may force Babcock to no longer use a chip-and-go system but rather concentrate on maintaining possession of the puck. Replacing Zaitsev, a player who didn’t excel at breakouts but instead often resorted to stretch passes out of the zone, with a stronger player, should mean less risk for the team.

Adding players like Tyson Barrie and Jason Spezza allows the Leafs to spend more time carrying the puck and also diminishes the use of dump-and-chase. Dubas, taking a “new-school” approach to analytics, has absolutely done his homework on the level of success each style of play produces. That could be why his roster tweaks should change the way Babcock approaches his pregame planning.

We will not know for sure until the preseason but we can anticipate seeing something new out of Babcock.