Toronto Maple Leafs: Brendan Shanahan Should Have Fired Himself

Brendan Shanahan should have walked away from his role with the Toronto Maple Leafs today instead of firing Kyle Dubas.

Does Brendan Shanahan forget that he’s the one who hired Kyle Dubas as GM of the Toronto Maple Leafs? He inflicted pain on the franchise, hired Mike Babcock and Lou Lamoriello, then eventually gave Dubas and Keefe the reigns before letting them both walk.

With Dubas out as GM of the Leafs, Keefe will seemingly be gone before we know it too.

When a new manager comes in, the coach is typically the next to go, so it would be shocking to see Keefe behind the bench for opening night of the Leafs 2023-24 season.

Over his tenure as the President of the Leafs, Shanahan convinced the board that the Leafs needed to get worse before they got better and that philosophy worked. They tanked, drafted Mitch Marner and Auston Matthews and before we knew it, they made the playoffs for seven straight seasons.

Shanahan took a team out of the gutter and turned them into the most successful regular season of the past decade, but in reality, he wasn’t the one who did that. It was the role of Kyle Dubas who made Shanahan looked good, but that no longer will be case as Dubas doesn’t work for the franchise anymore.

Toronto Maple Leafs Should Have Fired Shanahan and Promoted Dubas

If I listened to the press conference correctly, Shanahan fired Dubas because he had second thoughts about being the GM of the Leafs next year. Dubas cited that this was a very hard season on him and his family and he needed a few days to think.

After thinking about what he wanted, he eventually told Shanahan that he in fact wanted to be the GM of the Leafs but Shanahan decided to fire him instead.

You know how many people come home after a hard days (or year’s) work and tell their spouse that they want to quit or think this isn’t the right job for them?

Literally every single human in the world.

After going through hell, it’s the most natural reaction to say that you’re not sure what the future holds.

However, Shanahan got mad and fired him regardless. That’s the most elementary school thinking I’ve ever heard and Shanahan should have been the one who got fired instead.

The “Shana-plan” hasn’t worked and his leadership hasn’t got Toronto anything. Instead of firing the person who was the only one seemingly doing his job, the board should have fired the former player, Shanahan, who doesn’t know how to run a franchise.

Shanahan’s thinking hasn’t worked and the firing of Dubas will only set this team back even further. If I were on the board, I would have actually promoted Dubas to President of Hockey Operations, giving him full reigns on the franchise and then fired Shanahan instead.

Dubas is the NHL’s version of Theo Epstein and the next team he goes to will probably win the Stanley Cup. Shanahan dropped the ball on this and I hope the Leafs miss the playoffs next year as a result.

This is the worst decision the franchise has made since they hired John Ferguson Jr., as GM roughly 20 years ago. The Leafs are now in a worse position than they were 48 hours ago and I’m embarrassed to be a fan and even more embarrassed of Shanahan’s immature thinking when it comes to running a hockey team.

This was one of the most pathetic ways you could fire the best executive in hockey and I hope it backfires on the Toronto Maple Leafs immediately.