Last season ended when the Toronto Maple Leafs lost in the playoffs to a heavily favored rival by one single goal, in overtime, in the seventh game.
The Toronto Maple Leafs, with all their best players injured or sick in some way, grinded a vastly superior team to within a single goal of an upset, and all their fans could think about after was WHAT IF?
What if their team had actually improved at the Trade Deadline? While other teams were adding superstars like Jake Guentzel and Noah Hanifin, the Leafs tinkered at the edges, ultimately wasting draft picks on low impact players and failed to improve their team.
It was a massive miscalculation from the guy who accidently turned the Florida Panthers into a potential dynasty. The question now is, did he learn enough to help out more this year?
It's not looking good.
After Humiliating Trade Deadline Failure, Did the Maple Leafs Learn Anything?
With teams gearing up for the playoffs ahead of the 4 Nations Tournament, the Leafs are once again left looking like they have no plan. Two of their conference's best teams just added a superstar each (Rantanen, Miller) and now the Leafs are an even longer shot to win the Cup than they were two weeks ago.
The Leafs are a deeply flawed team that doesn't have an effective third or fourth line, and which has a below average blue-line that can't move the puck very well.
Last year they brought in Joel Edmundson, Ilya Lyubushkin, and Connor Dewar. It was embarrassing. They didn't add any impact players and bizarrely, and inexcusably, they stuck with Ilya Samsonov even though they'd had him on waivers in January.
Without hyperbole, it is accurate to say that Brad Treliving had the worst trade deadline performance of any GM in the NHL last year, and that his failure directly cost the team a chance to advance in the playoffs.
It is clear that the Leafs cannot fix all their problems at the deadline. They just don't have the assets or cap-space to address five different areas, nor should they. By going with a lot of small upgrades, the Leafs will show they learned nothing with last year's failure. Failure, by the way, is a good thing and helps you win in the future - IF YOU LEARN FROM IT.
So does Brad go out and make one big trade, putting all his chips into the middle for one big kick at the can? Do the Leafs make a huge play and bring in the number-one defenseman they desperately need?
Or are we talking Scott Laughton or Ryan O'Rielly and another two month vacation in TO for Luke Schenn? Or do we have a GM who can actually deliver the Stanley Cup?
Time will tell.