After last night’s latest Maple Leaf disaster, in which they allowed four goals in the first period en route to a 7-0 pounding by the injury depleted New York Rangers, one has to wonder just where everything went wrong. GM Brian Burke’s map for building a Stanley Cup contender starts from the net out. He focuses on acquiring talent in goal, then on defense, before looking to upgrade the offense.
I think, at this juncture, as I have mentioned previously, we’re still stuck on phase two, the defense, and perhaps, with Gustavsson’s performance of late, we may have to shift back into first gear before we gain any traction. However, with a stable including James Reimer, Jussi Rynnas and Ben Scrivens, I’ll give Burke a pass for now and say we’re stuck on phase two.
So let’s take a look at the current snapshot of the season so far. Luke Schenn leads the league in giveaways. Francois Beauchemin is 4th. Tomas Kaberle is 11th. Mike Komisarek, in limited ice time, is 62nd. Of players with at least one goal, Dion Phaneuf is last in shooting percentage. Tomas Kaberle is 3rd last. Francois Beauchemin is 8th last. Of the 8 combined goals the defense have scored so far this season, none have been on the power play.
Luke Schenn is 12th in the league in hits. The next Leaf, Mike Komisarek, is 81st. Dion Phaneuf is 27th in defensemen shots, 17th in missed shots. Tomas Kaberle is 38th in shots taken and 47th in missed shots. This defensive unit is not contributing offensively or defensively. Players like Beauchemin and Phaneuf are having career-worst seasons on the ice. Komisarek, with limited ice time, is still making mistakes, but offensively his numbers are about where you’d expect them to be. Schenn is having a respectable year, as any who watch can attest to the fact that yes, his giveaway totals are high, but they’re not often of the heart-attack inducing variety.
Let’s rewind this picture to just two seasons ago. The Leafs top 6 was slightly different, as we had Pavel Kubina, Tomas Kaberle, Ian White, Jeff Finger, Luke Schenn and Anton Stralman. Were they more talented? Kubina’s career numbers are about in line with Phaneuf, while White’s best numbers look similar to Beauchemin’s. Anton Stralman and Carl Gunnarsson are about equal, so your only other replacement would be Komisarek over Finger. Is that minor change enough to justify the difference? How different were they?
Luke Schenn, in his rookie campaign, led the Leafs in giveaways, but was 20th in the league. Jeff Finger was the next Leaf defenseman, all the way down in 66th. Ian White was right behind him in 73rd. Luke Schenn had the lowest shooting percentage of Leafs with at least one goal, but he was good for 20th last. Anton Stralman was 30th last. Pavel Kubina had 14 goals. White added another 10. Finger had 6. Combined, they had 42 goals. This year, the defense has just 8; on pace for just 14 on the season.
The hitting statistics don’t change much and the penalty kill was an atrocious 74.7%, good for last. The PP was middle of the road with 18.8%, good for 16th. 17 of the 42 defenseman goals were scored on the power play. While this year’s penalty killing is marginally better at 77.5%, we’ve also taken less penalties, averaging 12 minutes per game to the 2008-2009 season’s 13.7 minutes per game.
So what, exactly, is going on in Toronto? Luke Schenn is the same player he was two years ago, hitting well, contributing a little offensively while still making giveaways. He’s made some improvement. Tomas Kaberle is still not scoring much, but is racking up power play assists like they’re going out of style. Phaneuf has missed 16 games with a leg injury so far this season, but is certainly well off his career numbers. Francois Beauchemin seems to have completely fallen apart, making costly giveaways in his own zone while not putting up anywhere near the numbers he used to.
Mike Komisarek, while being prone to giveaways, is still contributing as a hitter and on the scoresheet, given his limited ice time. Carl Gunnarsson seems to be returning to last season’s form and is at least on pace to be as big of a contributor as Anton Stralman was two years ago. Yet something is different. Some of these differences can be attributed to the decision to have Kris Versteeg on the point on the first power play unit, taking away their opportunity to earn points, but one has to question whether this is the correct approach.
Defensively they are atrocious. Players are left to stand in front of our goalies uncontested. We make horrible first passes and stretch passes out of the zone and we’re often caught out of position. Has the coaching system changed? Or are the new players, namely Phaneuf and Beauchemin, simply not capable of playing the system they’re running? Are the defensive pairings not taking advantage of each player’s strengths? Is the problem linked to the forwards? The goaltenders?
This is what Brian Burke needs to sort out before attempting to fix this problem. It could be a simple matter of a coaching change, or even an assistant coaching change, as it is often the assistants that handle these aspects of the team’s system and teachings. It could be a line pairing issue. Mike Komisarek played his best hockey with Andrei Markov, and yet we’re not pairing him with our version of Andrei Markov in Tomas Kaberle. Dion Phaneuf has always played his best alongside Robyn Regehr, and yet we’re not pairing him with our version of Robyn Regehr in Luke Schenn. This would leave a Beauchemin / Gunnarsson pairing, which could work in more ways than one as Beauchemin could mentor the younger Gunnarsson.
Ultimately, it may let to yet more personnel changes, as I’ve already documented the long line of players (19 in total) that have patrolled the blue line for the Maple Leafs in the past 3 seasons. If push does indeed come to shove, however, at least Burke may have more in the offing this offseason, as players like Kevin Bieksa, Christian Ehrhoff and Chris Phillips are unrestricted free agents while players like Brent Seabrook and Shea Weber are restricted. One thing is for sure, this is the most critical aspect of the team that needs fixing right now, and Burke needs to take a step back and forget about that #1 C until our blue line shows signs of improvement.
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Born and raised in Northern Ontario but currently living in Toronto, Tyler wouldn't have it any other way. Home to his two favourite sports teams, Tyler revels in the day to day sports experience that is Toronto. 