The Toronto Maple Leafs have hit one of the lowest points in years. The club has evidently given up on the season, and, well, there just aren’t any easy answers to what’s going on.
The narrative coming out of the organization is that a roster shake-up is needed. Moving players around will lead to the right pieces falling into place. But they’ve already done that, and this year’s team is objectively worse than last season’s.
Anyone who has followed the Maple Leafs will notice that this team just isn’t playing to win anymore. They’re going through the motions and are comfortable with losing games they could win.
That’s why the shake-up must begin at the top. We’re talking about dumping Brad Treliving as GM and Craig Berube as coach.
Leafs must address management issues
Let’s begin with Treliving. I have to admit I wasn’t a fan of Kyle Dubas. But overall, he did a much better job than Treliving. Dubas at least helped build the core that led to a couple of solid seasons.
Treliving, unfortunately, has spent valuable resources on assets that have not yielded the desired results. If this were a corporation, Treliving would have shareholders running him out of town with pitchforks and torches.
As for Berube, it’s clear he’s lost the room. There was a reason why the chatter about a coaching change came up around December. Perhaps Berube’s firebrand personality has just gotten old on players. Maybe there’s something there that we don’t know about that’s led to the decline in the team’s overall attitude.
Perhaps it was just last year’s Game 7 loss in Florida that hasn’t let the team move on. It’s kind of like suffering a traumatic event in life. Life goes on, but you never truly heal until there’s a major change.
That’s the sort of thing plaguing the Leafs at the moment. The organization needs a shift at the top. The Buffalo Sabres did that. They dumped their GM and brought in Jarmo Kekalainen. That situation spurred a turnaround.
A similar situation occurred in Detroit last season with their coaching change. This year, the Red Wings look to be on a mission.
The Leafs could take a page out of the New York Islanders’ playbook and change their GM ahead of the NHL Draft. With the season pretty much over for the Maple Leafs, the organization can spend the time following the trade deadline till the end of the season to find a replacement for Treliving.
Once that replacement is in place, the Maple Leafs can then go about finding a new coach in the offseason. That’s the sort of shake-up that needs to happen before players are jettisoned at random.
Otherwise, the risk is ending up in the same spot the New York Rangers are at this point.