The Leafs are presenting the usual dilemma in terms of grading this year. On the one hand, they failed to make the playoffs: more than half the other teams didn't. That alone should mean an automatic F, right? Especially since it was reasonable to assume a team that missed by the thinnest of margins last year, which upgraded its goaltending substantially and added a first-line winger touted to score at least 30 goals, would be a good bet to qualify for the post-season this time around.
On the other hand, certain players have met and even exceeded expectations this year and there are flickers of brightness amidst all the underperformers. It's also reasonable to suggest that any one of a number of little things could have improved the team's situation markedly. If Toskala hadn't been hurt; if he'd been handed the #1 job out of camp; if Toronto had any semblance of a special teams coach; if Andy Wozniewski had been benched...woulda coulda shoulda, they say.
Never mind. The team is where it is, and each player has earned his grade.
GENERAL MANAGER John Ferguson Jr. C-; Cliff Fletcher B+
I'm grading Ferguson on this year only. There is some controversy as to whether or not John was actually permitted to run the team. Circumstances suggest he wasn't. Given that, and given the acquisitions of Toskala and Domenic Moore, I'm willing to cut the man a tailor shop worth of slack. I think he did the best he could with the situation this year. If only he had performed better over the past two seasons, he'd probably still have the job.
Fletcher has also been handcuffed through no fault of his own. He went into the trade deadline looking to stockpile picks but was greatly hindered by the refusal of his best assets to waive their no-trade clauses. Even so, he got a respectable return on Belak, Kilger and (especially) Gill. He also signalled further changes, and many of them, which is just what this team needs and what it has refused to contemplate for years.
COACH Paul Maurice D
And that's rather charitable. Paul is exceptionally good at handling the media, but behind the bench he's very nearly clueless. Where to start? Okay...he rides his goalies into the ice; he all but refuses to call a time out, no matter how badly his team might need one; it took him an unconscionably long time to find lines with any chemistry at all. Most damning, his team's power play is mediocre and its penalty killing is abysmal. Granted, these aren't the most talented players, but a good coach makes his players better, and Maurice has by and large failed to do this.
FORWARDS
Captain Mats Sundin A-
You can't fault his effort and you can't dispute his talent. Once again he led the team in scoring by a wide margin and establish more franchise records. His production is remarkably consistent, even at his advanced (by hockey standards) age. Whatever this team's faults, he's not to blame.
Jason Blake C-
Again, slack has been cut, this time due to his cancer: you just can't expect the same kind of year he had last year, not after a diagnosis like that. However, there are glaring flaws in his game. He almost always opts for a low-percentage shot when a high-percentage pass is staring him in the face. Also, he can't play defense to save his life. Some improvement on a line with Tucker and Stajan, but overall? Meh.
Darcy Tucker D
Picked up his game only after the games became meaningless. Another guy coming off a career year and putting up disappointing numbers. Seems to have lost his feistiness, and Darcy with no feistiness isn't much of a player.
Matt Stajan B
Thrives with extra minutes: I hope people noticed that. Give this man three years and a real coach and he'll at least be nominated for a Selke, if not win one outright. Gets my vote for most improved Leaf this year.
Thomas Steen C+
Also improved, and playing with a great deal of confidence as the season winds down. My issue with him is an almost total lack of grit...but this is a team-wide concern. Fairly solid two-way play. Still developing. I don't think he's an adequate Sundin replacement, but he's not bad.
Nik Antropov B+
Finally put it together this year, missing only a handful of games. Uses his size very effectively. He's always had the size and the soft hands, but the knock on Nik was that the slightest knock on Nik would have him injured for twenty games. Hopefully he has overcome this...but I wouldn't quite bet on it. Much better defensive forward than he's given credit for.
Kyle Wellwood D-
Not at all what I expected out of him this year. Okay, he was hurt; but both before and after that injury he's played as if the slightest contact might kill him. He's a wizard with a puck, but that's the only dimension to his game.
Alexei Ponikarovsky C-
In Carolina one night, he found himself with a glorious scoring chance...and fanned on the puck, which was immediately picked up, scooted back down the ice, and deposited into the Toronto goal. It's hockey: it happens. The thing to do is shrug it off and play better next game. Poni didn't. Thirty games later, he still hasn't got his game back. Can be useful down low and has some defensive smarts but will never be more than a role player.
Boyd Devereaux C-
Regressed this year. Still hustles, but hasn't put up points at the same clip he did last season. Another Leaf that missed significant time due to injury. He should rebound next year, but it might not be in Toronto.
Domenic Moore A-
This year's Devereaux: man, has he impressed me. There are nights when he's the best player on the team. Buzzes around like a little bee and creates something nearly every shift. Lacking a bit in finish, but you don't expect your third and fourth line guys to put up a point a game. I hope the Leafs keep him.
Jiri Tlusty D
In fairness, he's a rookie who probably shouldn't be in the NHL yet, let alone on a first line. But I can't help wondering what all the fuss is about this kid. He's nobody's scoring machine and he can't play defense. He's the Leafs' most highly touted prospect and that's a scary thought.
INC--but all D's at best: Mark Bell, Simon Gamache, Kris Newbury, Robert Earl, Alex Foster, Darryl Boyce, Ben Ondrus, John Pohl.
That's quite the platoon of Marlies (save Bell)--and not one of them, including Bell, made any sort of favourable impression.
DEFENSE
Tomas Kaberle B+
Still an upper-echelon defenseman whose chief asset is his ability to skate the puck out of trouble. He's not as good without the disc, though. Very good offensively (sits eighth in NHL scoring among rearguards as I write this) but still doesn't shoot often enough.
Bryan McCabe C-
Season marred by injury, but even taking that into account he took several steps backwards. The team does seem to play better when he's in the lineup, though. Still prone to defensive brainfarts and his one weapon, the low slapper from the point, has been neutralized. Overpaid.
Pavel Kubina C+
Hard to grade, as he's been two different players this year. For two thirds of the season he was average at best, with a propensity to take stupid penalties. Over the last third he's been nothing short of fantastic, exhibiting a bullet shot and playing very well in his own end. As with much of the rest of the team, you have to question where the killer instinct was from October to February.
Ian White D+
Poor man's Kaberle: fair offensive sense but not half as good defensively. There's a reason he was paired with Gill, the only stay-at-home D the Leafs had before he was traded. I believe White is redundant on this team.
Carlo Colaiacovo B
...when he plays. Proudly upholding the Leafs tradition (cf. Wendel Clark, Nik Antropov) of spending at least half of every season hurt. Very good all-round player who throws the occasional devastating open-ice check. But yike, is he ever brittle.
Anton Stralman B-
For a rook, pretty good. Makes the odd mistake and some of them are doozies but he's also got very good vision and one of the best saucer passes I've ever seen. I think he'll develop into a Kaberle type, possibly even better.
Andy Wozniewski F
If there was a G, he'd get a G. For Gawd-awful. Directly responsible for at least five games lost and probably twenty or more goals against. How he managed to stay in the lineup for 48 games is one of life's greatest mysteries. Absolutely zero defensive ability and not much better in the offensive end, either.
INC, but shows promise: Staffan Kronwall
GOALIES
Vesa Toskala A-
Would get a straight A were it not for something of a shaky start as he adjusted to Toronto. Ninth in the league in wins, a very respectable GAA and SV%, and the flashiest glove hand on a Toronto netminder since I don't know who. Has proven beyond a doubt that he is not only a #1 goalie, but one of the better ones out there. Never mind Pogge, I say they ride this man as far as he'll take them. Given any kind of defense in front of him, that should be pretty far indeed.
Andrew Raycroft F
Another G candidate. And the G certainly doesn't stand for glove hand, because Raycroft doesn't have one. No confidence to go with his no talent. You have to wonder what happened to him after he won the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year a few years back. Bad goalie. BAD!
------
Much has been written of the culture of complacency that infects the Toronto dressing room. The team's stellar play post trade-deadline suggests two things: one, this team can play the game; two, only when there's nothing on the line. They'll try and spin it, of course, to suggest that everything was on the line, but realistically the Leafs were eliminated on deadline day. Earlier in the season, there were a number of blowouts, but much more disturbing was the number of third-period collapses. The team has lacked a killer instinct pretty much since Doug "Killer" Gilmour.
There's also next to no grit at all. There was a time that teams feared playing Toronto: now, they often start their backup goalies and they know they'll hardly be touched. They can run Toskala all they want without consequence. Nobody sticks up for a teammate. If the Leafs have hopes of improving, this has got to change.
Other things that must change: several years ago, the Leafs decided they didn't need no steekin' defensemen and turned their blueline corps into an offensive juggernaut. Trouble was, this benefitted opponents almost as much as it did the Leafs.
The penalty kill is beyond terrible. It's especially bad when you consider the Leafs (by virtue of not playing defense) tend to take a whole lot of penalties.
Team discipline is lacking: witness the above mentioned third period collapses and the inability to recover from questionable reffing or one soft goal against.
The power play has revived recently because Toronto finally decided to stop playing perimeter hockey and start putting the puck on net with traffic in front. This is powerplay 101--the idea is to put the puck in the net, not pass it all around the zone.
Most of this can be corrected with a coaching change; the rest will be address by means of a great deal of personnel turnover starting July 1.
It'll be interesting in precisely the way this edition of the Toronto Maple Leafs so often wasn't.
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