Toronto Maple Leafs GM John Chayka has started his tenure on mop-up duty. It would have been nice for Chayka to have started with a clean slate. Unfortunately, that was not the case.
Chayka came into the Maple Leafs front office like one of those relief pitchers who inherits the bases loaded and one out. Since an inning-ending double play wasn’t exactly an option, the only thing that Chayka could do was get one out at a time.
That’s what he did with firing Craig Berube. Berube’s dismissal is not really an indictment of Berube as a coach. It’s more of erasing another major mistake by former GM Brad Treliving.
When Treliving relieved Sheldon Keefe of his duties, the dismissal wasn’t overly surprising. But it was a mistake. It wasn’t a mistake necessarily because Keefe was riding high and getting results, but because he was the right type of coach to get the most out of the Maple Leafs’ lineup, such as it was.
With Berube, a 180-degree turn ensued. It was the type of drastic turnaround that didn’t promise to end well. And it didn’t. While Berube found some success in his first year, the clock struck midnight much faster than Berube and the Maple Leafs would have liked. Chief is a good coach, but just not the right coach for the Maple Leafs.
Under Berube, Auston Matthews became a shell of his former self. While he’s arguably a better all-around player, he isn’t scoring. And that’s why Matthews is most important.
Also, offense-first players like William Nylander have suffered. Well, the entire offense has suffered significantly.
Be that as it may, Chayka now has to figure out who the Leafs’ next head coach will be. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see Chayka channel his inner Kyle Dubas and look to bring in a younger coach who could get the most out of Matthews and Nylander, while they’re still on the team.
Would things have been different if Maple Leafs had kept Keefe?
So, a question I would like to explore is whether things would have been different if the Maple Leafs had kept Sheldon Keefe in the fold.
Without a time machine to travel to an alternate timeline in which the Leafs did keep Keefe in the fold, I can only speculate that the Leafs could have gotten past the Florida Panthers last season. The Leafs would have played the same style of hockey that smashed into the wall that were the Boston Bruins, Tampa Bay Lightning, and Panthers of earlier years. The Leafs could have taken advantage of a Panthers team that was running out of steam. In fact, the series could have been something like we’re seeing this year with the Vegas Golden Knights. Vegas is a veteran team that has a good mix of skill and physicality.
And yes, had the Leafs at least kept Keefe over the last couple of seasons, the team could have made it to the playoffs this year. It’s plausible to think that Marner would still be on the team, and the silly Brandon Carlo and Scott Laughton trades would have never happened.
Ultimately, we’ll never know. But one thing is certain: The Maple Leafs are hoping to catch the same lightning in a bottle that they did when Kyle Dubas was GM. That’s why the club hired Chayka. And if Chayka has a similar vision as Dubas, the Leafs’ next coach should be the kind of leader who can get the most out of what’s left of the team’s core.
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