The Toronto Maple Leafs made no improvements to their team during the 2023-24 NHL season.
Today, 3 p.m. came and went, and the Toronto Maple Leafs stood pat with their very talented but severely flawed lineup.
All of their key competitors improved – some somewhat, others considerably.
The Leafs got worse with a pair of bone-headed moves for defensive defensemen, which will most likely result in the NHL’s poorest, slowest, and least mobile blue-line. Oh, and they added a competent replacement for Ryan Reaves, but you know they’ll trash their one positive move by sitting Pontus Holmberg instead.
They will play waiver-worthy Ilya Lyubushkin on the top pairing with Morgan Rielly (apparently learning nothing from their inability to score last year with Luke Scheen in the same spot), and Timothy Liljegren will be in the press box instead of the very awful Joel Edmundson.
They will not improve their team. Excuses about assets will not fly. This is disgraceful.
Trade Deadline. Was a disgrace and embarrassment to the Toronto Maple Leafs.
The Toronto Maple Leafs haven’t won the Stanley Cup in more than 50 years. They have never made it to the Finals since the NHL expanded beyond six clubs.
And, despite possessing the two best players in the history of a century-old club, they chose to do nothing.
They’ll enter the playoffs with terrible goaltending. They’ll have Max Domi playing too high up the lineup, and their blue line will be unable of facilitating offense. They will not be good at killing penalties.
They have several flaws and have addressed none of them.
Despite the fact that Auston Matthews is at the pinnacle of his career, the Toronto Maple Leafs decided it wasn’t worth trying to win. They still have a chance because their core can be unstoppable if they get hot along with their goaltender.
But the chances of that happening without a star goalie or defenseman on the roster are slim.
Last year’s team was faster, deeper, had more stars, and played superior defense.
This year’s version, courtesy to Brad Treliving wasting 15 of the 20 million he had to spend and then doing nothing to improve in-season, is substantially worse than last year’s.
Leafs fans can only hope for a fluke run. The most likely outcome is that they get demolished by the Boston Bruins in the first round of the playoffs.
I won’t be rooting for that outcome, but it might remove Brendan Shanahan’s toxic influence from this club, which is now a complete joke.
A five-year-old squad just outperformed the renowned Toronto Maple Leafs. They owed their followers so much more than this.
I am willing to forgive taking risks that do not turn out. I cannot accept doing nothing and hope for the best.