The Toronto Maple Leafs pulled out an overtime victory over the St. Louis Blues on Tuesday night. That snapped a five-game losing streak for the Buds, but doesn’t quite wash away the stench of an ugly start to the season.
General manager Brad Treliving faced the media on Tuesday to call the team out for its lackluster play thus far. He listed off a number of contributing factors to the team’s poor start. But one key element was not named, either by Treliving or the questioning media in the room.
Now, insider Elliotte Friedman, appearing on NHL Network Radio’s Morning Skate on Wednesday, has addressed the elephant in the room (or, more accurately, not in the locker room this season) for what’s wrong with the Maple Leafs. Many fans don’t want to hear it, but the absence of Mitch Marner simply must be acknowledged.
Marner’s absence cannot be ignored as a cause for Leafs’ lackluster showing this season
Nobody brought it up yesterday, but the Marner thing is a huge factor. He did so much for them, not only as a 100 point guy, but he was also one of their best defensive players too. And I think they are still trying to find their identity in the post-Marner world. I expected that to be the case, but I think it’s been a bigger adjustment than a lot of us anticipated and I think that’s why we are where we are. They’re still trying to figure out their way.
Let’s go over the core of the issues that Treliving raised that can be directly attributed to the loss of Marner: The now-famous “Vanilla” comment. The GM feels the team has been too “vanilla.” Former NHLer Jamie McLennan said on The Leafs Nation podcast that the term “vanilla” can be directly correlated to a lack of identity. Exactly the term Friedman used as well.
The team that used to be able to outscore opponents now has trouble doing that without its top creator on offense. “They could beat you on the power play,” “You had game-breakers,” are some of the points noted by McLennan. Those are Marner things.
I get it. No one wants to dwell on the past, or cry over spilt milk. But if there’s one thing that a Marner team can never be accused of, it’s being vanilla.
The Leafs’ power play has been woeful this season without its quarterback and playmaker, sitting in 28th spot in the NHL. By contrast, Marner’s new team, the Vegas Golden Knights, are 5th in PP%.
On the penalty kill, another Marner specialty, the Leafs have gone from the 4th-best last season, to 20th this year.
You can make all the excuses you want for what’s behind Toronto’s uninspiring start to the season. But you cannot ignore that elephant.
