Toronto Maple Leafs: No It Is Not the Time to Make Stupid, Lazy Decisions

The Toronto Maple Leafs don’t need to make a coaching change.

In fact, suggesting that they should make a coaching change is one of the single worst ideas I have ever heard, and my job is to discuss the Toronto Maple Leafs with strangers on a daily basis.

Sheldon Keefe is not only an excellent coach, but the team he coaches is having an excellent season.

There is no reason to even bring this subject up, as the Leafs are in 2nd or 3rd place in the NHL on any given night, and are doing it with the worst injury problems in the NHL.

Toronto Media Strikes Again

I hate the way in which we are so hostile to new ideas.  

If someone has a crazy Idea, like say trading T.J Brodie, I think we should hear them out.  But I don’t think that we should listen to so much  tired old nonsense. 

And what is older and more tired than to suggest firing the coach?  It’s the classic quick-fix.

Except, in this case, what is there to fix?

As mentioned, the team is currently excellent.

The Toronto Maple Leafs only lost last season, in game seven, to a border-line dynasty, because they were screwed over by a bad call in game six.  Effort, coaching, execution.  Can’t find fault with any of that from the Tampa series.

And the Montreal series featured Auston Matthews unable to take a shot, no Tavares, and at least two losses so unlikely to not even worry about.

Say what you will about those two losses, you can hardly put them on the coach.

As for his overall body of work, he has the highest points-percentage of any coach to ever coach as many games as he has.

The Leafs would liked to have had more playoff success over the last four years, but at the same time, we know, for a fact, that results can be wacky in short-samples.  We shouldn’t hold the Leafs to task so much for failing to advance.  Almost all their problems are just that they were unlucky.

Sheldon Keefe, for four seasons and 240 games, is flirting with a .700 winning percentage.  The Toronto Maple Leafs have been among the best teams in hockey for his entire tenure.  (hockey-reference.com).

.670 gives you a chance for the President’s Trophy, and that is Keefe’s points-percentage for 239 games.  That’s insane.  He is the last person who deserves to be fired.  He has a hard job and has done it well.

Firing Keefe Is Such a Spectacularly Bad Idea for the Toronto Maple Leafs

The Toronto Star owes him an apology.  Not only do they erroneously suggest firing him, but they advocate replacing him with a coach who – you can’t make this up – has a history of losing game 7s.

The #1 thing that comes to mind when you think of Bruce Boudreau is “he loses in game seven, every time.”   He is also nearly 70 years old.

The only thing lamer than constantly trying to fire the coach because you have no other ideas, is recycling the same losers over and over.  The Canucks are a much worse team than the Leafs, and Boudreau is a much worse coach than Keefe.

There is no reason to think that Boudreau is even worthy of being Keefe’s butler, let alone replacing him.  No offense, I’m sure he’s a super nice guy.

He has missed the playoffs four times as a coach.   Keefe has never missed.

Boudreau has been fired from four teams.  Keefe has never been fired.

Keefe’s regular season record is better, and they have the same amount of Stanley Cups.

Here are three things you need to know about how the NHL Media works:

1. Boudreau is a NAME,  Keefe isn’t.
2. The Leafs haven’t won in the playoffs.
3. Any of the actual reasons for that are routinely ignored and made fun of (called excuses by people who don’t not understand things like probability, variance, game theory).

This means that only easy answers can be offered up as solutions.  But even by NHL Media standards, suggesting to fire a perfectly fine coach to bring in an oft recycled, old, name-brand version is ridiculous.

It’s such a bad, unnecessarily, and horrible idea. There isn’t one single argument to be made that would justify this change.  Not only is it a lazy idea, and so much low-hanging fruit, but there isn’t even a reason for it.

If the Leafs were losing and had to make a change, it would still be extremely lazy and unimaginative to consider Bruce Boudreau.  Or Joel Quennville. (explative deleted).

So even if Keefe’s job was in jeopardy – it isn’t – this would still be an extremely bad, lazy and stupid idea.

If the Toronto Maple Leafs did need a new coach, they should use their vast resources to find the best candidate, and not just automatically go with a a 70 year-old guy who has been fired from four teams and has shown absolutely zero ability to be effective in the modern game, having last won a playoff series in 2015.

You can’t make this up.  People want the Leafs to hire a coach who hasn’t won a playoff series in a decade, and the same people think Ryan O’Reilly should be their biggest trade target, and he is in fact a player who didn’t get out of the first round for the first ten years of his career.