Report: Former Toronto Maple Leafs Coach Mike Babcock Back in NHL

An Ex member of the Toronto Maple Leafs is back in the NHL.

Early Saturday afternoon, Darren Dreger reported that the Columbus Blue Jackets would be hiring former Toronto Maple Leafs coach, Mike Babcock.

Babcock has been out of the NHL ever since the Leaf fired him.

While Babcock may be one of the most recognized and accomplished coaches in NHL history, including a Stanley Cup, 2 Olympic Gold medals, and being the only coach to be a part of the Triple Gold Club, his reputation quickly fell off in his last few seasons with the Leafs.

Report: Former Toronto Maple Leafs Coach Mike Babcock Back in NHL

In just a few minutes of this report, many hockey fans and analysts were voicing their opinions of this move on social media, and the replies were not very positive.

And rightfully so, despite Babcock’s long list of achievements, those days are long behind him, and multiple controversies have come up recently showing that Babcock is not the quality coach we all thought he was.

Back in his days as coach of the Detroit Red Wings, Babcock scratched Mike Modano late during his final regular season. This scratch ended up costing Modano a chance at his 1,500th game, and numerous reports have said Babcock was aware of his decision to scratch Modano and what it meant.

Another controversial event took place when Mike Babcock coached the Leafs.

Babcock confronted then-rookie Mitch Marner about his supposed “laziness”, and then asked him to rank every one of his teammates in terms of how hard they work on a day-to-day basis.

Marner made the list, putting himself in last place. Babcock then went and shared the list with other players on the team. Not only did Marner not agree with this, it also brought him to tears. (source).

Babcock put a 19-year old rookie in such a terrible spot and it made Marner and many other Leafs players furious with him.

Babcock was fired in November 2019, just over halfway into his 8-year contract with the Leafs.

Now on Columbus, Babcock is tasked with coaching another young core of players. Including Kent Johnson, Cole Sillinger, Adam Boqvist, and this year’s 3rd overall pick.

In my opinion, if I was a Blue Jackets fan, I would not be happy with this decision. You must feel the most sorry for Johnny Gaudreau, who recently escaped Darryl Suter, only to end up with Babcock a year later.

We’ll see how this hiring works out for Columbus.