3 Best Moves By Brian Burke as Toronto Maple Leafs G.M.
Brian Burke did not have a good career as the General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs, but he did make a few great moves during his tenure.
As we already discussed this week, Brian Burke was not a very good G.M with the Toronto Maple Leafs and he made a ton of mistakes while being in charge.
The NHL was moving away from his philosophy of old-school hockey, so unfortunately he set the franchise back a few years instead of moving them closer to a Stanley Cup.
During Burke’s tenure, the Toronto Maple Leafs never made the playoffs, went through two coaches and a string of bad goaltenders.
Burke was quoted in The Toronto Star in October, 2010 talking about how he wanted his team to play, saying: “We pursue the puck in all three zones. We hit in all three zones. We fight. And we try to score a lot of goals.”
Although that’s an entertaining philosophy to have, the Leafs were never one of the highest scoring teams in the league and fighting wasn’t an important factor in the game anymore, so his model was flawed from the start.
Within that Toronto Star article, Burke belived in entertaining fans and truly thought that the acquisition of Dion Phaneuf and Phil Kessel was enough star power to entertain die-hard Leafs fans. I mean, they definitely provided entertainment, but it was for the wrong reasons.
Phaneuf got called out for his suspect defensive play, while people mocked Kessel because they thought he didn’t try enough on defense. Kessel was looked at as a one-trick pony who could only score goals and because he didn’t have a glowing personality, he was ridiculed.
It was an unfortunate scenario, because every teammate of Kessel raves about him in every interview they do, so he was in a tough situation being the face of the Leafs. As is now seen from his days in Pittsburgh, Kessel is a great player on a Stanley Cup winning team, but just shouldn’t be the star of one.
Although the Burke days were tough, he did make a few good moves to acquire players that would eventually help the team get back to relevance.
Here are the top three moves by Brian Burke during his tenure as Toronto Maple Leafs G.M.
#3. The Acquisition of Joffrey Lupul and Jake Gardiner
Here’s the full trade:
- Toronto Maple Leafs trade Francois Beauchemin to Anaheim Ducks for Joffrey Lupul, Jake Gardiner and 2013 Fourth Round Pick (117th Overall)
The fact that Burke was able to take an average 30-year-old defenseman in Beauchemin and trade him for Jake Gardiner, who was a 20-year-old offensive talented prospect defenseman would have made this trade a steal, alone. However, getting Lupul in the deal as well make this an A+ trade.
Having previously drafted Gardiner as the G.M. of the Ducks, Burke knew a lot about him and understood his upside. The Ducks were a veteran team looking to get back to another Stanley Cup Final, so acquiring Beauchemin was a win-now move, so they were fine with moving on from a prospect.
The Ducks defense during the early 2010s was filled with great young talent, so although Gardiner would have for sure cracked their line-up, the Ducks thought he was expendable in order to get an already proven NHL defenseman in Beauchemin.
Gardiner took a lot of heat during his time in Toronto, although most of it was unjust. He was an incredible skater who always kept his head up in the ice to make offensive plays and could contribute between 30-50 points each year. His defensive play definitely wasn’t the best at times, but he was a proven top-four defenseman.
Acquiring Lupul was a risk, as he was coming off injury concerns, so it was unclear which player you’d be getting. Although he was injury prone in Toronto, when healthy, he was a dynamic player.
Lupul had two 20-goal seasons, including a 25 goal and 67 point 2011-12 season. His creative ability to make plays was remarkable and he instantly became a fan-favourite, as the only current player jerseys you’d see at the then Air Canada Centre were Phil Kessel, Dion Phaneuf or Lupul’s.
This trade was awesome, but there’s only one other Burke trade that topped this…
#2. Trading Luke Schenn for James Van Riemsdyk
There just aren’t a lot of hockey deals like this that happen anymore.
A one-for-one, young player for another young player type of trade, where maybe a change of scenery will help turn these players into the dynamic player they’re meant to be.
During Schenn’s first year with the Leafs, he looked great and like someone deserving of the fifth overall selection, but by year-four, it felt like fans wanted him gone. He seemed slow and his defensive play dropped.
Van Riemsdyk on the other hand, was a former second-overall draft pick who had already had a 20-goal season in only three years in the league. At 6-foot-3, 220 pounds, the big-body frame of “JVR” was something that would become very valuable in-front of the net, but the Flyers decided to move on from him for some defensive help instead.
Eight years later, they clearly regretted that move, as the Flyers recently signed him back to a five-year, $35 million contract, while Schenn has played on five more teams, struggling to get an NHL contract.
If you were to submit this trade in NHL 20, the video game would laugh at you and the computer would not allow it to go through.
Burke absolutely stole JVR away from the Flyers.
During JVR’s time in Toronto, he scored 154 goals in 413 games (0.37 per game average), and had two 30-goal seasons.
He was never going to burn past a defender and score a goal, but his ability to score in the dirty areas and on the power-play is what made him so valuable. His hands in front of the net are some of the best in the entire NHL, and it’s crazy to see how quickly he can get the puck up from such a close proximity to the net.
Kudos to Burke for being able to see the decline in Schenn’s game and flip him for an offensive talent in Van Riemsdyk.
#1. Drafting Nazem Kadri and Morgan Rielly
You can call it luck, or you can praise it, but the ability to draft Kadri and Rielly are two key pieces to Burke’s legacy as Toronto Maple Leafs G.M.
Since Burke was hired on November 29, 2008 and fired on January 9, 2013, he was apart of the 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012 NHL Entry Drafts.
Although his drafting and scouting ability was abysmal in 2010 and 2011, he hit big in 2009 and 2012.
It’s never good to be drafting seventh in your first draft as G.M., then fifth in your last draft as G.M., but that’s how it went for Burke.
As we’ve talked about before, he did a terrible job as the G.M., but at least he got it right with his first draft in 2009 by selecting Kadri.
When you think of the Toronto Maple Leafs of the 2010 decade, Kadri’s name always comes up. He played at least one game in every season of the decade and was a fan-favourite. He made a few dumb mistakes during the playoffs, but his ability to redefine his game as a two-way centre, while scoring 30-plus goals a season made him an invaluable player.
As everyone knows, the Leafs recently traded him to try to acquire more defense with Tyson Barrie, but that’s backfired. It’s unfortunate the team wasn’t able to figure out a way to keep him because he’s the type of player you love to have your team but hate to play against.
The Morgan Rielly draft pick was probably Burke’s best pick ever as the G.M., and fans still have to thank him for that selection. It wasn’t a no-brainer selection at the time, as Rielly had just been injured for most of his draft year, so teams were skeptical, but Burke never was.
Burke even told Sportsnet that he would’ve taken Rielly first overall if he had the pick, although he was fortunate to see him fall to number-five where the Leafs selected him:
“To me, his skating was so advanced – and you could see it was going to get better with some power – that he could skate the puck out of trouble at all times, his decision-making was good. His maturity as a kid was good; this is a guy who when he was hurt he’d go meet the team when they’d come back after a road trip at 3 or 4 in the morning, he’d go and meet the bus on crutches.”
Rielly’s been the best defenseman the Leafs have had in a decade and is a staple on the team’s blue-line. Depending on how he long he stays apart of the Toronto Maple Leafs, he could go down as the team’s best defenseman ever.
Next. 3 Worst Moves by Brian Burke as Leafs G.M.. dark
Although Burke’s overall tenure was poor, he fortunately blessed Leafs fans with a few good moves during his short stay in Toronto.