The Dong Remains The Same

The Boston Bruins easily beat the Toronto Maple Leafs 5-2 last night. It was really a difficult game to watch from a Leafs point of view. Leaf haters: rejoice! You may not see a display that poor for quite some time.

This was the game, as I remember it:
- Marc Savard scored 19 seconds into the game. He was wide open after getting a pass from an equally wide open Glen Murray. The Leafs defense had more holes in it than a meth head's face.

- Milan Lucic pretended he was Zdeno Chara and Koci'd Mark Bell.

- Andrew Raycroft allowed 5 goals on 27 shots (.814 save % - ouch), at least 2 of which were very weak goals.

- The Leafs had 5 powerplays (including two in the third period) to Boston's 1 (early in the first) and were still dominated.

- Bryan McCabe nearly gave away a short-handed breakaway opportunity - similar to the gift he gave to Mike Komisarek recently - but the Bruins player fell.

- Andy Wozniewski has been looking worse and worse. Last night Woz was -3 over 9:35 of icetime. Brutal. For my money, if you are going to have a 6th defenseman on the team that'll play 10 minutes as Woz does, it should be Staffan Kronwall, who has looked good since his recall from the Marlies; or Anton Stralman, who is dying for another taste of the NHL.

- Sticking with the defense theme - I am supremely unimpressed with Ian White lately. He has somehow been the only Leaf defender who's escaped his share of the blame for the team's defensive woes. I think it's time that Ian was taken down a peg or two. My game notes from the last several games have White being directly responsible for opposition goals.

Paul Maurice may not have his head fully up his ass...
A quote by the coach after the game last night: "We've got to find a way to move the puck better from our end or Stralman's going to have to come back and move the puck for us."

BAM! That's it, Paul. You were too much of a sissy to bench players that were consistently underperforming (like you said you might), but threatening to bring in a rookie to right the ship? That may work. I mean, at the very least it'd be humbling to the current defensemen. After all, isn't puck movement supposedly one of the defense's strong points?

Wisdom from the new guy:
Staffan Kronwall quotes, from last night:

[1] "We're getting caught in our own end for too long,"

[2] "We don't make the aggressive play right away as we need to do. Instead, we get caught and wind up in our own zone for two minutes. Then you get tired and they score goals on us."

I fucking love it. The new guy is taking the piss out of the Leafs' defensive system. Translation: it is so bad that not only does the new guy realize, but he isn't afraid to say it.

P.S. Your new website is fucking garbage:
The first good thing to come out of The Hockey News since they switched to a new website format is the newest installment of Screen Shots by Adam Proteau (a The Hockey News blogger). He lists several instances where NHL general managers may have been better served by letting their star players go, rather than re-signing them to gigantic contracts that handcuff the team. The picture in the article is this close-up of Bryan McCabe. Go figure.

Jason, you've been given a lot of leeway this year...why fuck that up?
Jason Blake, last night: "To be honest, I'm getting a bit sick and tired of people pointing the finger at Bryan McCabe. They constantly scrutinize him, and that's wrong. It's not just one guy's fault, it's the whole team."

That may be true Jason, but the most glaring mistakes always catch the eye of the fan, and Bryan McCabe has made the most glaring mistakes. Everyone remembers Bill Buckner's epic error in the 1986 World Series, but it wasn't only his fault that the team lost the series. That's how most remember it, though, as it's the easiest single event to pinpoint.

Perhaps we should take your advice and begin to look elsewhere for players to scrutinize? Last night was the 1/4 mark of the season and you have 2 fucking goals. Jason, you're on pace for 8 goals. That's 1 goal per $500,000 salary you earn. You are ranked 451st in shooting percentage (5th worst of all players that have scored a goal). Should we transfer blame to you?

I want to note something else here: I was all set to rip into Damien Cox for not calling out Blake, because Cox is clearly more negative than Debbie Downer. There was no doubt in my mind that Jason Blake had been spared because of his illness. Damien then admitted to it in his latest column. Good on you, Damien. You're the worst, but you'll definitely get credit where it's due.

Rumours: Not just a killer album:
For a couple of weeks now, internet rumours - admittedly about as reliable as a 1992 Chevy Cavalier - have stressed that the Leafs' current stretch of games against their divisional opponents holds the key to the direction the team will take. Do well and the team remains. Do poorly and trades will be made.

So, with that in mind, I've actually been excited watching the team lose to the Rangers. Then to Montreal. Then to Boston. And, almost certainly against Ottawa tomorrow night. If you want to extrapolate a little further, the Leafs' next game after Ottawa is against the same Bruins that handed them their asses last night. Realistically, the Leafs could be in the midst of a 5 game losing streak before they play the Dallas Stars next Friday.

If that is the case, I pray to Mick Fleetwood that there are a couple of fresh faces on the team...