The matter of Cody Ceci

 I apologise for such a long blog today, nervous energy mostly. Well, here it is, warts and all.

Cody Ceci was born in Ottawa, played the bulk of his OHL career for the hometown 67’s, was drafted by the Senators and spent the first six seasons of his NHL career there.
Ottawa, in other words, was all Ceci really knew.
Like it has for so many others in the Maple Leafs dressing room this fall, Toronto has been an adjustment.
“It’s always tough when you switch teams and everything’s new and you have to pick up where you’ve been living for the last few years,” said Ceci, who swapped spots with Nikita Zaitsev in a summertime trade that freed the Leafs of Zaitsev’s long-term deal. “Leaving Ottawa was a bit more different because I’m from there. But I really enjoy the guys here, really enjoy the city.”

Then, he added: “It’s great to have a chance to play with these guys. We’re always in every game and our guys can score, so it helps out.”
Ceci went through some tumultuous times with the Senators. He was overly burdened from a young age on some rough hockey clubs that weren’t in every game and often couldn’t score. What seemed interesting then on the day he officially landed with the Leafs — July 1, the same busy day that saw Nazem Kadri dealt to Colorado for Tyson Barrie and Alex Kerfoot — was the inference from GM Kyle Dubas that Ceci would “probably play a little bit of a different role here.”
Seventeen games into the season and that hasn’t proved to be the case.

Cody Ceci is averaging over 22 minutes for the Leafs this season. (Dan Hamilton / USA Today)

Ceci is still munching lots of minutes — 22:36 per game, almost exactly the same as last season — and doing it primarily in tough terrain, opposite top lines on the team’s top pair. The only real and not insignificant difference, outside of the vastly superior skill level of the group in Toronto, is the quality of partner he’s got at his side, a now perennial Norris Trophy candidate in Morgan Rielly. Ceci bounced through a mishmash of partners over 440 games with the Senators.
Former Leafs captain Dion Phaneuf was probably the most frequent of the bunch.
“Before that, maybe Phillips?” Ceci said, referring to Senators defensive legend Chris Phillips. “He was great. He was setting the games-played record for Ottawa. So, he had been there a long time and I was brand new.”

Seventeen games into the season and it’s still not clear (unsurprisingly) what the Leafs have in Ceci. A temporary stopgap where one was needed on right defence? A salvageable piece for the future — one who turns only 26 in December? A miscast part that needs to be replaced and moved down in the lineup?
What we can say is, so far at least, the Leafs are sort of making it work with the 25-year-old.
He’s had his bumpy moments — like late last month in Montreal when Brendan Gallagher slithered around him to score a goal for the Habs, or Thursday night, when he inadvertently shoveled a rebound right to Max Pacioretty, who scored the Golden Knights’ first goal.

Generally though, wiping away the reputation from Ottawa, and any preconceived notions that went with it, it’s hard to conclude that hasn’t gone OK so far for Ceci with the Leafs.
The longtime dark cloud of the analytics world is sitting right around 52 percent in the expected goals department, a far cry from some of those turbulent years in Ottawa. The connection with Rielly hasn’t been perfect, to be expected with any new partnership, but by the numbers the two are performing about as well as the Rielly-Ron Hainsey combo of last season. Not fantastic. But not bad either.

Can Mike Babcock depend on Ceci, a former first-round pick, to check David Pastrnak, Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand in a playoff series — and do it well? Can Ceci handle that grind for four rounds if the Leafs can get that far? Does Ceci process the game fast enough to do it? Or do the Leafs need to find an alternative solution sometime before then? Make another trade, a big one maybe, to finally solve the question mark on the right side of their top pair?
Or, do they need to hand off the most challenging assignments to a different group, just as they did last spring when Jake Muzzin and Nikita Zaitsev took over at playoff time?

Against Vegas, in a 2-1 Leafs win, it was Muzzin and Tyson Barrie checking the Knights top line of Pacioretty, Mark Stone and Paul Stastny — though Babcock might argue that the William Karlsson-led second unit is pretty potent, too.
Dubas’ remark notwithstanding, Ceci said he knew coming into his first season in Toronto that his role would include more of those top lines and a whole bunch of penalty killing. He’s gotten first-unit duty there, too, in tandem with Muzzin and fared, well, OK — ranking third among the Leafs’ primary four defenders in expected goals against per 60 minutes.
Meanwhile, the Leafs have outscored foes 15-12 five-on-five when Ceci has been on the ice.

 The jury is still very much in doubt whether Ceci will fit in, or flip out for the Maple Leafs, but one thing is sure, Martin Marincin isn't about to take his job. Now Rasmus Sandin, that's another matter.

Stay tuned.

Leaf Prospects

 Once a year, I release my ranking (and evaluations) for every single prospect in the Toronto Maple Leafs organization.

The criteria are simple: To be eligible for the list, the player must be under 23 years old and either drafted by the team or signed to an NHL contract, without having established themselves as full-time NHL players. Players whose rights have expired, or who are signed to an AHL contract (sorry, Justin Brazeau, Hudson Elynuik, Kristians Rubins and Co.), are ineligible.
This installment features 28 players, down from 29 on the most recent list this past summer. That’s because since adding Aaron Luchuk from the Ottawa Senators in the Nikita Zaitsev trade, Egor Korshkov and Dmytro Timashov have graduated from the list due to age, and in Timashov’s case, promotion to the Leafs.

Overall, the quality of the Leafs’ prospect pool remains weak relative to the rest of the league. It’s probably somewhere in the bottom third even with the recent strong play of a select few players this fall. The Leafs’ ability to maximize their new development system with the ECHL Newfoundland Growlers, or to turn the Brazeaus of the world into NHL players, will be vital to sustaining the NHL club’s ongoing need for cheap depth.

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1. Rasmus Sandin, LHD, 19 (AHL Toronto Marlies)

Sandin showed he belonged during his brief six-game stint with the Leafs earlier this fall, driving possession and contributing without getting exposed defensively, the latter something I felt could happen early on. Back in the AHL, he has picked up where he left off during last year’s playoffs when his game reached new heights. His defensive game still needs a little polish. And while I like his physicality, his positioning off the puck could use some work. I’d also like to see him shoot a little more. His confidence with the puck helps him escape pressure and keep the play going downhill.

2. Nick Robertson, LW, 18 (OHL Peterborough Petes)

The good news here is that Robertson leap-frogging Liljegren and Bracco on the list has more to do with his exceptional play than it does with anything wrong they’ve done. I’ve watched a lot of Robertson over the last few months. I watched him play in Plymouth, Mich., for a week at the World Junior Summer Showcase; for another week in Traverse City as part of the Leafs’ prospect tournament, and twice more in person with the Petes to begin the year. During my time watching the Petes, Robertson recorded a hat trick, 10 shots, and a fight.
I’m not being hyperbolic when I say he looked, in all three settings, like an unstoppable force. He wowed USA Hockey staff as he dominated a tournament that included the likes of Kirby Dach and Kaapo Kakko. In quick order he has become one of junior hockey’s most dangerous scorers. I was higher on Robertson throughout his draft year than most — he finished 30th on my draft board while the Leafs plucked him 53rd overall — and yet in hindsight, I was still too low on him. He may not just become an energizing, middle-six forward at the next level, he may become a star. In a 2019 re-draft today, he might go in the teens.

3. Timothy Liljegren, RHD, 20 (AHL Toronto Marlies)

Remember when I said Robertson rising to No. 2 wasn’t about Liljegren? Yeah, it wasn’t. Following a lacklustre Maple Leafs training camp where he never really put himself in the conversation for one of the open defence spots, Liljegren has played some of his best hockey with the Marlies. He’s being aggressive and showing some offensive flair on a more consistent basis while continuing to defend well. I still have concerns about his stride mechanics and how his north-south speed would translate at the NHL level, but there’s not a ton else to criticize in his game these days.

 

4. Jeremy Bracco, RW, 22 (AHL Toronto Marlies)

After posting 95 points in 88 games (regular season and playoffs) with the Marlies a year ago, Bracco has continued to produce, particularly as a playmaker, early in his third season of pro hockey. Eventually, he’s going to earn an extended look at the NHL level, where I believe he could be a successful top-nine winger with the right linemates and a dynamic playmaker on a power play. His challenge is that the longer the Leafs wait to give him that look, the less likely he is to get it. In March, Bracco will turn 23. At some point, his age will begin to hurt his trade value.  So the clock is very much ticking.

5. Joseph Woll, G, 21 (AHL Toronto Marlies)

After a shutout in his pro debut, Woll hasn’t played particularly well since. That’s to be expected, though, for a rookie goalie coming off of an injury (broken finger) that sidelined him through his first training camp with the team. Woll will be fine, and he remains the Leafs’ best hope as a potential replacement for Frederik Andersen, or even as an NHL backup. He’s got the size (6-foot-4 and weighs more than 200 pounds), he definitely has the athleticism and he’s a student of the game who is dialed into the technical elements of the position and is driven to improve.

6. Semyon Der-Arguchintsev, C/RW, 19 (OHL Peterborough Petes)

There’s no way of sugar-coating SDA’s season last year: It was bad. Like, really bad. For a player with his skill, particularly as a puck carrier and a passer, he too-often looked pedestrian and ineffective. And while I believe that some of his production this year is a byproduct of playing on a line with two, shoot-first players in Robertson and Coyotes prospect Liam Kirk, you don’t challenge for the OHL lead in assists by accident. It’s absolutely fair to question whether SDA’s game will translate in the pros — I do every time I watch him play — but there’s no questioning his ability to thread passes through seams, or hang onto the puck long enough for a teammate to get open.
I recently asked Petes general manager Mike Oke about SDA’s hot start and whether, despite the huge point totals, he’d like to see him shoot more.
“(Der-Arguchintsev) for the second year at Leafs camp made another positive impression. It’s been a good fit with (Robertson). I think there’s certain areas in the offensive zone where if you’ve got the puck, you have to be selfish and shoot the puck. Just because you shoot the puck, you’re not being selfish for the wrong reasons, you’re contributing to the team and the strategy of getting pucks to the net. Sometimes the best way to do that is to make a pass to the open man, and other times it’s by just getting the puck to the net and having others go real hard for secondary chances.
He’s been much better this year (at shooting). He’s a highly-skilled player. The big thing for him is to just continue to work at both ends of the rink. And we’ve really seen with Sem that he’s done a good job of coming down and back and helping out low and then jumping into the rush as the play exits our zone. Then in the offensive zone, he can get into holes for the puck or find a man who’s in a better position of doing that.”

(OHL Images)

7. Mikko Kokkonen, LHD, 18 ( SM-liiga Jukurit)

Coming off four consecutive seasons performing at a level well above his age group, Kokkonen suffered an upper-body injury at the World Junior Summer Showcase that caused him to miss training camp. He hasn’t looked the same since. The good news is that his low early-season production and rough defensive numbers aren’t truly indicative of his skill. This is a kid who, in his U16 season, led Jukurit’s top U20 junior team in scoring with 26 points in 38 games. Before this summer’s injury, he was being groomed to play a leading role on Finland’s next world junior team. He needs to get healthy and get back on track, though. And fast, because it hasn’t been a good start to the year.

8. Mac Hollowell, RHD, 21 (ECHL Newfoundland Growlers)

Hollowell is one of the guinea pigs in the Leafs’ new three-tier development system. And the early results have been encouraging. Hollowell is a unique player in more ways than one. He’s already an NHL-quality skater, he’s dangerous in transition and he shoots right. Those things make him really interesting. But he’s also small for a defenceman. Not just in height and stature, but in strength. Can he overcome that with an active stick and a style that helps him spend more time on offence than defence?
He has already shown he can be one of the best defencemen in the OHL. He’s beginning to show the same is true at the ECHL level and I think he’ll soon be demonstrating the same at the AHL level too. And yet, I’m not sure if that will ever translate to the NHL. Still, I wouldn’t be shocked if he’s a dominant AHL player two or three years from now, and able to step in and help an NHL club.

9. Joey Duszak, RHD, 22 (ECHL Newfoundland Growlers)

After struggling out of the gate with the Growlers, something that’s not all that surprising given the disappointment that probably came with his demotion and the change of scenery, Duszak has looked fabulous of late as a threat to create offence from the Growlers’ back end. He’s the kind of player the 2019 Kelly Cup champion Growlers always lacked; they never had a proper power-play quarterback and relied on a defence by committee along with its talented group of forwards. Duszak is too skilled to stay in the ECHL for long and I suspect that both he and the Marlies recognize that. When the Leafs gave him an NHL deal instead of an AHL deal, they did so because there were several teams that were interested in adding him as a college free agent. This time next year when he’s a month into his second and final year of that entry-level contract, I expect he’ll be excelling at the AHL level. I really think there might be something here.

10. Mikhail Abramov, C/RW, 18 (QMJHL Victoriaville Tigres)

One of my favourites in last year’s draft, Abramov has continued to take positive steps this season in Victoriaville, where he leads Les Tigres in scoring. Though his numbers don’t yet leap off the page, it’s important to consider that the Tigres are one of the worst, and lowest-scoring, teams in junior hockey this year. In my viewings, I’ve liked that Abramov has begun to look to score more this season. He has always been a crafty puck carrier who can involve his linemates, but he’s also now leading Victoriaville in shots. And while he’s still a long way away from being a finished product, I like that the Leafs bet on Abramov’s talent and skill with a fourth-round pick.

11. Nicholas Abruzzese, C, 20 (NCAA Harvard University)

Abruzzese: *Leads the USHL in scoring*
You: “Why would the Leafs draft a 5-foot-9, twice-overager?”
Abruzzese: *Picks up three points in his NCAA debut*
On one hand, selecting a player like Abruzzese when he’s going the college route will always be odd because if he plays four years at Harvard he’ll turn 24 in the summer before he turns pro, full-time. On the other hand, if he keeps racking up points then maybe he won’t have to spend four years in the NCAA.

12. Ian Scott, G, 20 (AHL Toronto Marlies, for now…)

I don’t really have anything new to add on Scott that’s any different from what I wrote about him in my July ranking because he hasn’t played since then. I did recently ask Sheldon Keefe for an update on his status, though. The latest is that after making some strides and getting back on the ice — Scott has been dealing with a groin injury — he suffered a setback and the team ran some tests.
“He’s still not showing a lot of signs of improvement,” Keefe said. “He just hasn’t been comfortable enough to get back into the net.”
When he does get back into the net, it will be with the Growlers. Until then, he remains in Toronto for rehab.

13. Filip Kral, LHD, 20 (WHL Spokane Chiefs)

Two facts about Kral:

1. He’s one of the better defencemen in junior hockey.
2. He’s also one of the oldest.

That makes evaluating him hard. I like his transition game. Kral is calm under pressure, eager to activate, and smart enough to make the outlet pass when the opportunity to activate isn’t there. I don’t like some of his defensive habits, however, and that’s where things like his consistently strong plus-minus rating across three WHL seasons can be deceiving. Kral is effective with his stick and a strong skater, but he can get caught standing around, or misplaying his gap, and those are issues that will get exposed at the pro level. Truthfully, I’m not sure what he is. I don’t see a ton of NHL upside, despite the fact that he’s got an extended track record as a position-driving, entry-creating defender in the WHL. We’ll see.

(Allison Farrand / For The Athletic)

14. Aaron Luchuk, C, 22 (AHL Toronto Marlies/ECHL Newfoundland Growlers)

“One does not simply walk into the OHL and lead it in scoring.” – Boromir, I think.
I’m not sure Luchuk’s ECHL points-leading success prior to his promotion to the Marlies should really strike anyone by surprise. After earning an entry-level contract and envisioning an NHL future, the Sens gave up on the clearly-talented centre when they included him in the Cecil-for-Zaitsev swap after a single pro season. He has looked good as a sophomore, and while the jury is still out on what kind of pro player he can be, I think a contributing top-nine AHL forward is his floor and that’s fine at No. 14 in a prospect pool that just traded away back-to-back first-round picks.

15. Mike Koster, LHD, 18 (USHL Tri-City Storm)

After impressing the Tri-City storm with the immediate impact he had as a prep school rookie late last season, Koster missed the beginning of his first (and last) full season in the USHL for an undisclosed reason earlier this fall. Since returning, things have come along slowly for him. Still, I like Koster for the same reasons I like Hollowell: He can skate, he can play in transition, he looks to impact the game offensively, and he can recover when he makes a mistake. He’ll come out of this and I expect him to become an impact guy in the USHL this season. I’m looking forward to seeing how far he can take things at the University of Minnesota next year, too. If he makes it, it’ll be a long road. If he doesn’t, his modern skillset, like Abramov’s, is still a worthwhile gamble in Round 5.

16. Kalle Loponen, RHD, 18 (OHL Sudbury Wolves)

After looking hesitant and unsure of himself early in the year, Loponen has begun to establish himself as a reliable, efficient, go-to option for a Sudbury team that, with some trade deadline tinkering, could contend for an OHL championship. Loponen told me he hopes to be one-and-done in Sudbury, with plans to return to his contract in Liiga next season. If he continues to play well and progress, I don’t think it’s out of the question for him to compete for a third-pairing role on a strong Karpat team next year. He’s not dynamic by any means, but he gets the puck up the ice and defends really well the other way.

17. Eemeli Rasanen, RHD, 20 (SM-liiga Jokerit)

I still don’t understand how any or all of the Leafs, Rasanen, or his advisors thought it was a good idea to leave the OHL early in pursuit of a league as strong as the KHL. The result has been limited ice-time with sporadic trips on loan to Mestis, where, because he’s not with the team year-round, he doesn’t really get a chance to get comfortable and build confidence. The Leafs have done a really good job developing their young players in recent memory but barring a miracle, they look like they’ve botched the progression of a kid who actually demonstrated some really interesting qualities in Kingston.

18. Vladislav Kara, C/RW/LW, 21 (Ak Bars Kazan)

Do I think Kara is a legitimate NHL prospect with a future above mid-level pro hockey? No, not really. But he has progressed from dominant a MHL player to dominant VHL player (Russia’s second-tier pro league) and he looks ready to take on a more prominent role in the KHL, the world’s second-best pro league. That’s not half bad for a versatile, 21-year-old, two-way player who has experience at all three forward positions.

19. Riley Stotts, C, 19 (WHL Calgary Hitmen)

Stotts is a good WHL centre who excels as a passer, has improved as a scorer, tends to make mistakes by hanging onto the puck too long, and hasn’t progressed quickly enough to make you think “that kid’s going to be more than an OK AHLer.”

20. Pontus Holmberg, C/LW, 20 (Växjö Lakers HC)

There are some things to like about Holmberg’s game that should translate well on smaller ice. I’m a fan of the tempo he plays with — he’s an agile skater who reads and reacts to plays quickly — and his ability to give-and-go. But after really impressing me to start last season, his progression has stalled. What you’re left with is a player who may make a run at pro hockey in North America, but probably just ends up as a career SHL/AHL/ECHL-guy.

21. Ryan O’Connell, LHD, 20 (NCAA Ohio State Buckeyes)

After playing a limited role last season, O’Connell has spent some time on OSU’s top pairing, and power play, to begin this year. The increased role represents a major opportunity for a kid whose broken arm from two seasons ago set him on a path that has largely been about easing him into the NCAA game ever since. I’ve always liked some of the qualities in O’Connell’s game. He’s a borderline-excellent skater, he sees the ice really well — both on outlets and from the point in the offensive zone, which was highlighted in a beautiful primary assist on the PP a week ago — and he’s a sound man-on-man defender off the rush. I’m looking forward to tracking whether he can really take his offensive game to the next level in an increased role as a sophomore, and eventually as a junior and a senior.

(Thomas Skrlj)

22. Jesper Lindgren, RHD, 22 (AHL Toronto Marlies)

Lindgren’s somewhat of an anomaly on this list in that he’s already the kind of player some of the guys ahead of him project to be. He established himself as a good pro defenceman in Sweden, a very good defenceman in Finland, and now he’s a serviceable option on a strong AHL team’s third pairing. But he’s also 22 and I’ve seen so much of him play by now that I’ve got a pretty good sense of what he’s going to be, which is basically what he has already been, with potentially a little more upside. And so he slides down the list a few spots in favour of players who have more runway to surprise and take substantial steps forward.

23. Martins Dzierkals, RW/LW, 22 (Jukurit)

I still love watching Dzierkals play. His ability to break ankles with a lateral cut as a carrier will forever make him entertaining. But he just never added the other necessary elements to his game, mainly a little more strength to complement that skating, to become more than a decent pro.

24. James Greenway, LHD, 21 (NCAA University of Maine)

He’s massive, he can skate for his size, and after leaving the University of Wisconsin for a year in the USHL before joining the University of Maine this fall, he’s beginning to contribute in what would otherwise be his senior year. That’s positive. My concerns with Greenway’s game remain the same as they always have been: He takes too many penalties, he’s often overly physical when there’s an available play on the puck, and he’s a shoddy defender for a kid whose role ought to be geared towards the penalty kill because he doesn’t have any real high-end puck skills that will translate at the pro level.

25. Zachary Bouthillier, G, 20 (QMJHL Saint John Sea Dogs)

Maybe he’ll have an Ian Scott-esque turnaround. Or maybe he won’t.

26. Semyon Kizimov, RW/LW, 19 (Lada Togliatti)

Kizimov has progressed like a player who was taken with the 211th pick in a 217-pick draft.

27. Vladimir Bobylyov, RW/LW, 22 (Toros Neftekamsk)

There are likely only 159 days left until Bobylyov is old enough that I won’t be including him on this list anymore.

28. Nikolai Chebykin, RW/LW, 22 (Toros Neftekamsk)

same as Bobylyov

Babcock pleased with Leafs effort

What you have to understand is that Mike Babcock loved it. Loved it. You might have seen a game where the Toronto Maple Leafs played a Los Angeles Kings team that looks like it only scores by accident, and that must make Anze Kopitar feel, at times, like he’s back playing for Slovenia against the big boys. You might have watched a game where not a lot happened for long periods, where the high-powered Leafs utterly failed to blow a bad team out of the water. Which, in fairness, was true.

But Mike Babcock loved it. He really did.

“Well, I thought it was a tough night for every line,” said Babcock after Toronto’s 3-1 win. “There wasn’t a whole lot.

What you have to understand is that Mike Babcock loved it. Loved it. You might have seen a game where the Toronto Maple Leafs played a Los Angeles Kings team that looks like it only scores by accident, and that must make Anze Kopitar feel, at times, like he’s back playing for Slovenia against the big boys. You might have watched a game where not a lot happened for long periods, where the high-powered Leafs utterly failed to blow a bad team out of the water. Which, in fairness, was true.

But Mike Babcock loved it. He really did.

“Well, I thought it was a tough night for every line,” said Babcock after Toronto’s 3-1 win. “There wasn’t a whole lot. (The Kings) didn’t generate anything either. They had to throw it in, couldn’t get it through from the point, we blocked shots. Some people thought it was ugly. I thought it was beautiful.”If you wanted to know the biggest difference in vision between the general manager of this team and its head coach, that’s it. Babcock hates risk. He hates risk when he has a Team Canada stacked with so many elite centres he has to play them on the wing. His Platonic team was the Team Canada that won gold in Sochi in 2014, winning 1-0 over the United States in the semifinals in a perform does he find it beautiful? That’s why.

“Well, just because of the fact that we need to go through it,” said Babcock. “We need to figure out who we are, and the harder the game is the better it is. Now, would you like to win by a touchdown, everyone relax? Yeah, but we’re not getting anywhere by that. This is important to do because you give up one goal, you play well without the puck, goalie makes some saves, we didn’t play it on special teams, we had to grind. It’s good for them.”

His players came out and lauded how patient the Leafs had been. They did dominate puck possession in the first, even if little of it seemed like they were playing Los Angeles’s game. They fell behind 1-0 in the second after an Alex Kerfoot penalty; they scored the tying goal with Kerfoot pursuing the puck, hounding it, which is something this team doesn’t always do.

“Not really exciting for anyone to watch or play, but I thought we did a good job staying patient,” said defenceman Jake Muzzin, who was playing his first game against his old team and was back after missing one game with a charley horse. “Sticking to our game plan. And you know, we found a way to get two goals in the third from playing the right way and not forcing it. Just kind of playing structurally sound and then waiting for them to kind of make a mistake, and we capitalized on it.

“Sometimes you try to force plays or force skill plays, and if we work hard and play, and play solid, our talent will show when the opportunity comes.”

Clear the Track...here comes Shack..

On a Maple Leafs team far removed from the Original Six era, Eddie Shack can’t teach Auston Matthews to shoot, Mitch Marner to fight, or Morgan Rielly to wrap up foes in the Tim Horton Hug.

But as frustrated as he is watching Toronto’s title drought go beyond 50 years, there’s a trait he thinks can transcend his lunch-pail Leafs to the mega-millionaires now in blue and white.

“Togetherness,” the 82-year-old Shack said Monday at the Steelcase Grill House where fellow NHL Old-timers toasted his new coffee-table book. “You protected each other because you’re not perfect. If someone gets into a fight, everyone gets into a fight. If something happened, you get in trouble away from the ice, you stick behind the person.

“If No. 34 (Matthews) was the captain, if he did something that wasn’t right, had a couple of cocktails, got aggravated (a case now playing out in court in Scottsdale, Ariz.,) that’s what you did for him.”

Shack said there was little choice for teams other than to bond in an austere NHL.

“There was no money (to fall back on). Yeah, we drank much more than the kids now, went to a bar and played bulls**t poker. But if we had a problem, we solved it right there. We weren’t in good shape as today, but we also stayed on the ice three minutes sometimes. We had a lot of fun. If Johnny Bower let one in short-side, we’d said ‘Hey, that’s a minor-league goal, you’re being sent down.’ Hell, I’d get sent down for misbehaving.

“But with the Leafs and Canadiens, it was ‘Hey s**thead, you gotta win that Cup.’”          

Shack, like Dave Keon and others, has come back into the Leafs’ orbit after many in the 1960s dynasty felt alienated, first by Harold Ballard and then years of failed rebuilds.

But that only made their stars shine brighter among nostalgic fans. No one could forget Shack, ‘The Entertainer’, who fought the toughest hombres on other teams or at least knocked ’em down and gave ‘em a whack, like the lyrics in a 1966 hit single Clear The Track by Douglas Rankine With The Secrets. The novelty song was No. 1 in Toronto until Nancy Sinatra bumped it with These Boots Are Made For Walking.

" Clear the track, here comes Shack
He’ll knock you down and he’ll give you a whack
He can score goals, he’s got a knack
Eddy, Eddy Shack

They call him a great entertainer
Ah, but Ed is no clown
It couldn’t be made any plainer
Great to have Ed in town

So clear the track, here comes Shack
He’ll knock you down and he’ll give you a whack
He can score goals, he’s got a knack
Eddy, Eddy Shack

He started year in the minors
And almost gave up the game
Boom is back with the big club
And the leagues just haven’t been the same

 So clear the track, here comes Shack
He’ll knock you down and he’ll give you a whack
You can’t score goals, he’s got a knack
Eddy, Eddy Shack "

There was the famous shot of Shack jumping Gerry Ehman of the Seals when he was with Buffalo and video of him eluding Battleship Bob Kelly and the Plager brothers who wanted to kill him one night at the Gardens in 1974 during his second incarnation as a Leaf.

“I can skate faster backwards than you bastards can forwards,” Shack chirped at the brothers to set them off.

“The fans used to get us going more than today,” he observed. “If I wasn’t playing, my dad would stand up across from the Leafs bench and start yelling ‘We Want Shack!’ Then I’d stand up on the end on the bench on my side and start the cheer, too. But Ballard would yell at me ‘If they want you so bad, go up and sit with them and shut up.’”

His book, with author/sportscaster Ken Reid, is subtitled Hockey’s Most Entertaining Stories and comes with an unusual proviso.

“I haven’t read it,” laughed Shack, still unashamed of his lack of comprehension after giving up on school while a lad in Sudbury. “People who read it like it. I want to hear what Bobby Hull and Wayne Gretzky said about me.”

His dad, a crane operator for Inco, also had a learning disability. Though he eventually learned to write after sometimes giving autographs just marked ‘X’, former teammates still razz him about his reading problem. Bob Baun would taunt him during games after Shack was traded, shouting ‘C-A-T’ at him.

“E-literate … why would they name something like that for someone who can’t read or write?,” Shack roared.

Reid kidded that he lost about 5,000 words from the text once he edited out Shack’s many expletives following their interviews. The book has many intimate family photos from Eddie’s wife Norma and tales of him defying his mother at age 11 to hitchhike 10 miles in morning darkness to Copper Cliff and play for a local team. He lied about his age at 13 to get a driver’s license, which he promptly lost drag racing on Highway 17. Shack also reveals his pride in having a gay son.

The money Shack didn’t earn in hockey — Shack was part of the 1990s group that pursued the league for lost pension money — he regained with a strong business acumen in everything from Christmas trees to shavers to soda pop. He must look at the far greater endorsement income of a Marner or Matthews with envy, but says he still watches the Leafs and the NHL intently.

“What are you going to do at my age but watch hockey,” he laughed. “It’s different than when we played, but it’s still good hockey.

“When I played, it was so easy to recognize people because they didn’t wear helmets. I have to go by the numbers.”

SHACK STILL NOSE PROMOTION

At 82, Eddie Shack hasn’t lost his proboscis for promotion.

The man behind the Pop Shoppe commercials in the 1970s, a staple of Canadian TV with dozens of other money-making ventures, managed to empty giant cartons of his new book on Monday at an event, while raising money for charity by auctioning off his omnipresent cowboy hat. He still gleefully plays off his Leafs fame, large nose and “not being the sharpest knife in the drawer.”

“When you’re this stupid, you can’t lie,” Shack said of just being himself in front of the camera. “I used to do commercials with (late Toronto Sun columnist) Paul Rimstead for Rough and Ready garbage bags. No practice runs with Paul, but he used to put words in the script he knew I couldn’t say.

“The thing I would like to do now, because I have battled prostrate cancer and I’m doing the Movember mustache thing, is a commercial for adult diapers. A lot of guys who wear them are embarrassed. Well I’m not. Then I could say ‘I have a nose for value and these diapers are the best.’ Wouldn’t that be great?”

Eddie did as many commercials as he could, Punch hated this

Leafs edge the Flyers in a long shoot out battle

As the shootout rounds kept passing and the options became limited, the mind of Toronto Maple Leafs head coach Mike Babcock started to wander.
"We started asking guys to look up YouTube videos to see what guys had scored in the minors," Babcock joked. "Actually, we have a pretty good list, but you start to wonder for sure where you are going."
Andres Johnsson scored in the 11th round of the shootout to give the Maple Leafs a 4-3 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday night.
Kasperi Kapanen, Jason Spezza and Mitchell Marner scored for Toronto, which received 37 saves from Frederik Andersen during regulation and overtime and 10 stops in the shootout session.
"We got ourselves a win and we've set ourselves up for a good win," Babcock said. "We've set ourselves up for a good week."
Ivan Provorov, Claude Giroux and Travis Sanheim scored for Philadelphia. Brian Elliott had 25 saves.
"I think everyone at tonight's game enjoyed it," Flyers head coach Alain Vigneault said. "For me, it was fun being part of it. I'm sure it was fun for the players to be a part of it. For the fans, I'm sure everyone had a great time tonight."
The 11-round shootout was the longest in Toronto franchise history dating to the start of the format during the 2005-06 season. It was the second-longest in Philadelphia's history, trailing only a 13-round loss to the New York Rangers in October2006.

The shootout period saw both goaltenders shine. Andersen and Elliott allowed one goal in the first 10 rounds of the shootout. In the 11th, Andersen recorded a glove save on Provorov from in close, while Johnsson was able to beat Elliott to the stick side for the winner.
"Just keep thinking who they're putting out and who we're putting out," Marner said. "Trying to guess where people are going to go. Hope Fred saves ours and hope we score on our chances."
Sanheim, Philadelphia's young defenceman, turned into a central figure earlier in the game. Sanheim was partially responsible for both of Toronto's goals in the first two periods, falling down while trying to change directions at the blue line, allowing Kapanen to break in and beat Elliott for his fourth goal of the season, giving the Leafs a 1-0 lead just six minutes in. Later, a Sanheim attempt to clear the crease of a loose puck was deflected home by Spezza to tie the game at 2-2.

However, Sanheim earned a bit of redemption just 31 seconds into the third when his backhander got past a sprawling Andersen for his first goal of the season and briefly gave Philadelphia a 3-2 advantage.

"We need him to be the player that he can be," Vigneault said. "He is fighting it right now. He is going through some growing pains. When he comes out of it, I am very confident that he is going to be a very useful player for this team."
That Flyers lead would disappear, however, when Marner turned a Sean Couturier neutral zone turnover into his fourth goal of the season by beating Elliott to the stick side, tying the game at 3 and sending it to overtime.

NOTES: Toronto captain John Tavares missed his seventh straight game with a broken finger. Tavares did practice on Friday for the Leafs and could return to the lineup on Tuesday night. . Giroux, who grew up in northern Ontario, has 35 points in 35 career games against the Maple Leafs. . Marner has points in four straight games. ... The teams will meet up again next Saturday night in Toronto.

Leafs falling

What is wrong with the Toronto Maple Leafs?

Is it as simple as injuries? Let’s not forget that two-thirds of last year’s top line, and a defenceman who would be in their top-four right now are out.

In a league built on parity, maybe not many teams could weather the losses of John Tavares, Zach Hyman and Travis Dermott.

(Dermott and Hyman are eligible to come off long-term injured reserve Friday vs. San Jose. I’m going to guess Dermott will, Hyman won’t.)

 I don’t think it’s injuries. They look like they don’t care. There is very little passion in their game. It’s like there’s something else going on in their heads.

Did all that social media hate over the summer get to Mitch Marner? Did Auston Matthews lose his mojo when the disorderly conduct charge he faces in Arizona come to light? Remember when William Nylander said he would dominate the NHL this year? From the far boards, I guess.

 Is Morgan Rielly wondering where Ron Hainsey is? Is Frederik Andersen wondering if he should play all the games? Is Michael Hutchinson wondering if Andersen should play all the games? Why does Andreas Johnsson think it’s a good idea to hook and hold in the offensive zone?

If ever a team was trying to get its coach fired ... I’ll let that thought sink in.

As for coach Mike Babcock, you’ve got to wonder what he’s thinking. He’s had three years to coach a system into his core players, and now they seem to be ignoring it.

He took a tough love approach with Marner (remember his fourth-line duty) and was pilloried for it, but of all the young guns, it worked for Marner.

He took a “praise all the time” approach with Matthews who was never great defensively but did display a dogged pursuit of the puck. The dogged pursuit is gone.

The Leafs have lost more than they’ve won out of the gate (5-4-2). A team that used to score its way out of trouble seems to want to skate itself into trouble on a regular basis

Pure and simple, they suck right now,  hope it doesn't last long.

Leafs Report card ( after 10 games )

Monday’s loss to Columbus was a microcosm of what we’ve seen from the Maple Leafs so far this season.
Some beautiful individual efforts that turned into nice goals for.
Some terrible decision-making and blown coverages that became goals against.

This is a thought bubble that I’ve presented here a couple of times, but one of the disadvantages Toronto has right now, that you see in a game like this, is some of their best players are still so young and still not fully developed two-way players.
For what they’re making, the Leafs need them to get there, in a hurry. Because other teams they’re up against are paying their Bergerons and Crosbys less – and they’re able to offer more, especially without the puck.

Which can be a great equalizer.
“The issues for us: shift length – discipline and shift length – and, then, sort it out defensively,” a frustrated Mike Babcock said after the game. “You know, we do lots of good things. The ability to maintain it and do it for 60 hasn’t been something that we’ve done, game in and game out, and that’s what good teams do. You’ve got to mature and grow up as a group for that to happen. You just have to. The level of focus that you bring to your job each day, no matter what job you do, has to be at a high.”

Ten games into 2019-20, the Leafs are 5-3-2. That’s a 98-point pace, or right around wild-card team territory in the East. (The Canadiens missed the playoffs with 96 points last season.)
It’s also, in my opinion, an underachievement for this group, if it ends up there, with fewer points than last season.
That said, there’s good baked in there in those results. And it’s worthwhile, at this point, to take a more granular look

So here we go.

The basics

The Leafs currently have a goal differential almost identical to what they finished with last season. The difference is they have been scoring more and allowing more, on a per-game basis.





Some of that is obviously percentage-driven, as we wouldn’t expect the Leafs to score on 11.5 percent of their shots or their goalies to be this porous over a full season.
And there are definitely positive indicators on the power play and in shot quantity and quality metrics. In all three of those areas, there’s tangible improvement over last season, enough to say they’ve probably “deserved” another point or two in the standings.

Even strength

So let’s look at that a little closer, comparing a few key shot metrics statistics from last season to this one.



Based solely on shot attempts (or Corsi), the Leafs are generating a similar number of pucks at net at even strength and have brought the attempts against down a noteworthy amount (four per 60 minutes).
Last season, five-on-five, the Leafs finished 27th in shot attempts against per minute.
This season, they’re currently 18th.
That’s not going to have Babcock partying in the streets. But it’s a shift that comes thanks at least in part due to new personnel and new tactics, specifically on the blue line. Here is the attempts-against statistic broken out into when individual defencemen have been on the ice.




This is one very simple stat: pucks directed at your net. But it highlights the shift in Muzzin’s results, in particular.
Replacing Hainsey with Ceci on the tough-match pair alongside Rielly might not be a huge upgrade, but it’s difficult to argue that Muzzin-Barrie hasn’t been a sizable improvement over Muzzin-Zaitsev.
This also highlights the impact Dermott could have once he returns, especially if he’s put into a third-pair role with Holl, who has played well despite getting most of his minutes with Marincin.

It’s harder to read much into the expected goals and scoring chance numbers, given the NHL has had some location-tracking issues early on this season. But it’s worth pointing out that the Leafs’ numbers in both expected goals and scoring chances are down far more than the league-average drop.
It certainly appears from this data that the Leafs are playing a less high-event style compared to last season, which could link back to the fact they’re not using that long-bomb stretch pass as often as a breakout manoeuvre.
Even without Dermott, the new-look top six here feels like it’s offered a legitimate upgrade over a year ago.

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Power play

The Leafs are still not drawing a lot of power-play opportunities, with only 28 after 10 games. (At least they’re not the Islanders, who have had only 12 after eight games.)
When the Leafs are on the man advantage, they’re scoring more effectively than last season despite weaker-shot locations. Last season, Toronto’s expected goals and chance counts were first in the NHL by a wide margin; this season, they’re down to only slightly above the NHL average.
The biggest reason for the weak underlying numbers here, however, is Toronto’s PP2 is posting absolutely brutal results so far. They’ve been getting nearly two minutes per game on the man advantage and done almost nothing with it, while PP1 continues to fire at an elite level.
At some point, the Leafs are going to have to lean in harder on their top unit, giving them the bulk of the minutes. Especially if they can’t start to generate more power plays.
Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner only getting 2.5 minutes a game on the power play is crazy considering star forwards elsewhere such as Elias Pettersson and Nathan MacKinnon are getting four-plus per night.

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Penalty kill

It’s not hard to spot the problem here. And it hurt them in a big way against the Blue Jackets.
One of the league’s least-penalized clubs last season, the Leafs have been on the PK more than all but four other teams this season. And Toronto’s PP-minus-PK-minute differential is third-last in the NHL.
They’ve been fortunate to get a couple of shorthanded goals, which offsets some of this, but the Leafs are on pace to allow 57 goals on the penalty kill this season on 279 opportunities.
Last season, they allowed 41 on 204 opportunities.
It’s frankly weird to see a team that is so fast and skilled resort to the number of stick infractions that they have early on. A lot of them have come from newcomers such as Kerfoot, Barrie and Shore, too.
And their coach is baffled by it.
“The penalties are hooking and slashing,” Babcock said, glancing at the scoresheet postgame. “Let me look right here – slashing, tripping, hooking, tripping, tripping.”
The Leafs’ PK has probably been more effective than a season ago, when Hainsey and Zaitsev would eat huge minutes every time. With better skating D out there, the chance counts are down. They look fine, as a unit.
They’re just on the ice too much.

Goaltending

This, frankly, might be the biggest factor of all in the Leafs record being what it is.
Andersen struggled early this season to find his form, although his play the past few starts has been far better. And Hutchinson hasn’t been able to duplicate his modest results from last season so far.
It’s early, but Tuesday’s start in Boston is going to be huge for Hutchinson to show he deserves a longer look in the backup role. Getting those starts on the second nights of back-to-backs is never going to be easy, so he’s going to have to steal them some games.
(No one asked, but Garret Sparks has a .931 save percentage in four AHL games so far.)

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Conclusions

I’ve done these types of breakdowns in my head for awhile, and I find it’s an instructive way to get an early glimpse at shifts a team can be making. But you’ve got to be careful not to read too much into small data points after only 10 games.

That said, on the whole, I think there’s more room for optimism than pessimism in these numbers. If the Leafs can get goaltending closer to their netminders’ career norms and stop taking so many penalties, there’s a clear path for improvement over last year’s 100-point season.


Especially once they’re healthy and have Tavares, Hyman and Dermott pushing some of the weaker depth options out of the lineup.

Make a comment or two.

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