The Toronto Maple Leafs continued their youth movement – and soft tank into the Austin Matthews sweepstakes – by signing the entire roster of the Avenue Road Ducks Select minor novice team to professional tryout contracts.
The move dropped the average age of the Leafs – second only to the Winnipeg Jets, who signed a local peewee team recently – to the lowest in the league.
Analysts and hockey insiders were stunned by the Leafs’ bold move. They had predicted the local heroes would rely on players from their Toronto Marlies AHL affiliate to ensure they would sink to the bottom of the league.
“The Leafs already have a young team,” said noted NHL insider Bob McKenzie. “I was flabbergasted, flummoxed and discombobulated to see the Leafs take this measure, especially considering they’re already scraping the league bottom with their current roster.”
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Under NHL rules, a lottery will be held to determine draft order, with lower-placed teams having a greater chance at the first overall pick, widely assumed to be the 18-year-old Matthews.
Despite its cellar-dwelling status, the Leafs’ Marlies call-ups, including the kosher kid, Zach Hyman, played beyond expectations, scoring goals and actually winning games.
Concerned over the Leafs’ unexpected success, team GM Lou Lamoriello sent the rest of the roster to the Marlies, “for a conditioning stint” expected to last the rest of the season.
With the addition of the Ducks, the Leafs were still left with 10 spots to fill, so the team looked to un-bolster its roster with more Jewish adolescent call-ups.
With hot chocolate and kosher Wacky Mac dinners before games as an enticement, JCC Chai Sports provided an addition six skaters to the teams.
Robbins Academy, Bialik, Leo Baeck and Associated provided two more each, on condition that Hockey Night in Canada games begin after sunset on Saturday and after assistant coach Jacques Lemaire performs a Havdalah service. Eitz Chaim turned down the request for a player when the Leafs could not agree to its condition that coach Mike Babcock would deliver a dvar Torah at each practice and before games.
“What’s a dvar Torah?,” asked the 73-year-old Lamoriello. “Is that some kind of fancy new analytics? What’s wrong with good, old-fashioned plus-minus? If it was good enough for Rashi, it’s good enough for me.”
As analysts digested the implications of the Leafs youth moves, the repercussions became clear, especially as regards the salary system.
Signing so many nine- and 10-year-olds will pay immediate dividends, said Hockey Night in Canada maven Elliotte Friedman. “They will save a ton in salary costs, pushing their payroll to near the salary cap floor.
“But there are added costs associated with the move,” Friedman continued. “First of all, the costs of all those snacks and doughnuts with sprinkles add up quickly when you’ve got hungry youngsters practising and playing. And then you’ve got to hire all those extra trainers and equipment managers to lace up their skates and make sure they’re wearing the right colour uniforms.”
Ducks’ skills coach Rob “I can’t do your thinking for you” Edelbaum was stunned at the news the Leafs had signed the entire 2006 Select team. “I can’t even get them to make three lines for drills during morning practice,” he lamented. “How are they going to learn the left wing lock and penalty-killing systems?”
Taking a closer look at the Leafs move, Edelbaum reconsidered his criticism and pointed out that the Ducks’ systems – or lack thereof – might actually resemble those employed by the Leafs in previous seasons.
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“I always thought the Leafs looked like a bunch of kids scrambling around for the puck,” he said. “Maybe signing nine-year-olds will make them better.”
As the rest of the league learned of the Leafs’ bold move, teams took steps to counter it in the race to the bottom. The Edmonton Oilers, familiar with life in the basement, reassigned their NHL squad to their farm team in Kalamazoo and signed a tyke team of seven year olds. Provincial rivals, the Calgary Flames, sent their team to Flint and recruited a group of four-year-olds from the local JCC’s “learn to play” program.
League commissioner Gary Bettman put the whole situation under video review while the NHL Players Association blessed the move, saying the added players will give the union more clout when negotiating milk and cookie breaks during the long, cold, winter season.
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