The Toronto Maple Leafs are a notoriously tight-lipped organization.
While that has not always been the case, the cone of silence which engulfs the Maple Leafs today first was implemented back when Lou Lamoriello entered the General Manager role in the summer of 2015.
That secrecy has remained consistent even following Lamoriello’s departure and continues to persist under Kyle Dubas, with little to no leaks seeping out of the front office.
Therefore, this standard of disgression makes it even more embarrassing to see random (or, in certain cases, disgraced) people pop up on Twitter and toss out completely made up “scoops” regarding the Leafs, all for the purpose of increasing their following.
Every single one of them is false. There are no exceptions. And yet, many people believe it.
Take Howard Berger, for instance.
Berger was once a Maple Leafs beat reporter for the National Post, covering the team for ten years stretching from 1999-2009. Obviously, he no longer does that. In fact, the time he has since been off of the beat is now equal to the time he spent on it. According to a profile written on him by the Toronto Star in June of 2018, Berger transitioned over to radio on Sportsnet’s TheFan 590 following his National Post gig and “hasn’t filed a report to air on Toronto radio since 2011”.
To put this in perspective, the last time Berger ever held an official form of employment that granted him a modicum of access to the Maple Leafs, I hadn’t yet entered high school. I am 23-years-old right now.
For those reasons, along with many others, it seems pretty unlikely that a former hockey columnist who has been out of the business entirely for eight years and now works as a Funeral Director’s Assistant would infiltrate the PR Fort Knox of the NHL and break the biggest news of the summer.
The @Canucks are considering an offer-sheet for Mitch Marner and have talked with the #Leafs about a trade involving Marner.
— Howard Berger (@Berger_BYTES) August 11, 2019
Berger tweeted that on August 10th, exactly one week ago today. Funnily enough, the only news dropped that’s been dropped the Vancouver Canucks in that time was a Friday news dump announcement that they had extended their GM.
Who could’ve possibly foreseen this?
Frankly, the facts that; a) the Canucks don’t even have enough cap space right now to offer sheet Marner in the first place, and b) their own RFA, Brock Boeser, doesn’t have a contract either, simply doesn’t matter.
Why bother with it? Applying any rationality to this nonsense is a waste of time because Berger doesn’t conduct himself on Twitter as a rational person. He just throws random stuff at the wall and then goes completely silent when none of it inevitably sticks.
You know, exactly like a very professional person would do (to be clear, professional people would not do that). Unfortunately (and hilariously), Berger is not the only culprit of this.
On the exact same day as that attempt at online comedy, Joshua Marshall tweeted confidently that league sources were telling him the New York Islanders were preparing to offer sheet Marner for seven years and at a total of $91 million.
.@NYIslanders Per league source out of New York says the #Isles are getting ready to offer sheet @MapleLeafs RW Mitchell Marner. At 7 years/$91M....AAV of $13M. Marner camp wants to do a 5 year deal at $13M according to the league source. We shall see where this goes........#NHL
— Joshua Marshall (@JMarshyBosco93) August 10, 2019
There’s a lot to unpack here. First, if you’re thinking to yourself “who the hell is Joshua Marshall?” don’t worry. No one else knows who this guy is either, and he’s certainly not an insider. Marshall is, in fact, a hockey podcaster – one with fewer Twitter followers than your Aunt Doris and the exact same number of connections inside the NHL, too.
Marshall co-hosts the “2 Mutts Podcast”. And while I have never listened to the show before and undoubtedly never will, I, therefore, cannot on its quality. A quick perusing of their Apple Podcasts page, though, shows them to have just 13 total ratings.
To contextualize that, I happen to host a podcast with my friend that we put precisely zero effort into, do not promote on Twitter, and basically use as a fun vessel for our conversations that pulls in roughly 80 listens per week, the bulk of which comes from both of our moms.
Our podcast has nearly double the number of ratings that Marshall’s does.
So, let’s get this all straight. You’re telling me that the most notoriously secretive executive in the NHL at the moment (and perhaps in its entire history), Lou Lamoriello, is feeding earth-shattering scoops to a guy whose podcast is akin to one that happens to be hosted out of a bedroom?
Yeah, I don’t buy that. Not for a second.
Berger, at the very least, has some industry experience. Marshall doesn’t, and is clearly just fabricating a bunch of nonsense with a complete lack of irony. Why is this bad? Well, he expects you to be dumb enough to believe him, and foolish enough to consider him an insider. Don’t prove him right.
Now, if Marshall was ever to read this, I’d tell him one thing: just go outside.
It’s August, dude. The weather will turn cold in a matter of weeks and you’ll ultimately have wasted the entire summer being stuck inside embarrassing yourself via a few fleeting seconds of “fame” that vanished as quickly as your sense of shame did.
Don’t do that. There’s still time! Leave the faux insider talk to the former-professionals. Frankly, they’re better at it than you.
I’m still waiting on that offer sheet announcement, J-Dog.