leaf Page 4 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
2021 NHL Previews: Fifty-four years between Cups for Toronto, going on 55
The Toronto Maple Leafs have now crossed the Rangers Line. The most famous Stanley Cup drought in history belonged to New York, which for years had to hear “1940” chants until Mark Messier, Mike Richter, and company finally broke the hex in 1994....
The last thing we need is a Maple Leafs docuseries
The whole behind-the-scenes docuseries has been a bit played out. Hard Knocks started it, and it came to hockey almost a decade ago with the 24/7 series that tracked the two teams in that given year’s Winter Classic for the month leading up to the New Year’s Day game. Some of it was compelling stuff...
Guess we’re gonna have to wait a little longer for all those other big NBA trades
Yeah, never mind, fam. None of that shit happened — yet — except for Russell Westbrook going to the Los Angeles Lakers, which was by far the biggest trade of the evening....
Hey, Knicks fans: At least you’re not the Maple Leafs
How bad was the Toronto Maple Leafs’ collapse? It’s better to be a Knicks fan right now....
Now the Leafs have the calamity they’ve always wanted
Because everything is outsized with the Leafs, the idea that they’ve been coughing up genuine chances at the Stanley Cup year-after-year has grown at the rate and scale of The Blob. Being the Leafs, everything around them is audibly multiplied by at least 12, so the sheer volume that is emitted from...
If it’s not the Leafs this season, which teams have the best (worst?) shot at passing the Rangers 54-year Cup futility?
The New York Rangers are the historic gold standard for futility in the NHL, having gone 54 years without winning the Stanley Cup until finally getting the job done in 1994 (see Mark Messier with the Cup above) — after decades of being taunted with “1940” chants in enemy arenas....
Seems like old times, eh Leafs?
By now you know the key points. The Toronto Maple Leafs haven’t won the Stanley Cup since 1967, haven’t been to the Final since then either, haven’t beaten the Canadiens in a series since their ’67 title clash, won their first division title since 2000 this season (thanks to being in the all-Canadia...
Hockey is the dumbest sport
It’s funny (but not), and fitting, that in a week where we’ve spent a great deal of time talking about baseball’s old, drunk, incontinent demons still plaguing the youthful and logical, hockey strolls into the saloon, hitches up its belt, and says, “Oh, you think you’re stupid? I’ll show you stupid....
After 28 years, hockey finally corrects its Habs-Leafs mistake
The NHL has been through so many realignments that sometimes you wonder if it shouldn’t just do a random draw before every season (actually, that’s not a terrible idea). It’s when you get to the real aims of past realignments that things get more interesting. ...
We are sick of writing about football players’ avoidable deaths
For the third time since February, I’m writing about the death of a former football player from either suicide or substance abuse, and I’m sick of it. First it was Vincent Jackson, then Phillip Adams, now Colt Brennan. Three men, all dead at far too young an age....
Once again, for those in the back: Cancel the Canucks season now, because this proposed schedule is doo-doo
The NHL came to its senses a tiny bit by pushing back the Vancouver Canucks’ return to the ice, but a team that already has a minuscule chance of making the playoffs still will be asked to play a grueling gauntlet of a schedule to close out the season....
The NHL trade deadline, and the Maple Leafs in particular, continue to be really weird
There’s nothing like the NHL trade deadline to warp what you thought you knew about teams’ priorities and how players are valued. GMs alternate between desperation to chase the Cup and desperation to get anything for players who can’t wait to high-tail it out of town at the season’s end. The process...
Jazz and Suns give us a sensational late-night cookie in a season lacking real drama
I’ve used this space to try and quiet any meaning to NBA regular-season games. It’s been especially acute this season, when teams have rarely been at full-strength, and they seem more intent on just being intact for the playoffs, which they know are what counts and are more likely to have at least s...
Auston Matthews can’t miss this year
The Maple Leafs were able to clear some, if not all, the clouds of stink out of ScotiaBank Arena after their collapse against the Senators on Monday by beating those same Sens 2-1 last night. You can be sure the Steve Simmons ilk will still be referencing that pissing away of a four-goal lead to the...
Ryan Leaf talks to Deadspin about CTE, substance abuse, and Vincent Jackson's tragic death
We’re getting a little more clarity on the death of former Chargers and Buccaneers wide receiver Vincent Jackson, and it’s a sad yet familiar story. According to Florida police, Jackson suffered from chronic alcoholism and his family feared that he showed signs of brain trauma stemming from his foot...
Here’s One Way to Get Revenge Without Throwing a Baseball at Someone’s Skull
Miguel Sanó destroyed a baseball on Saturday, launching a Joe Jiménez pitch off the facing of the second deck in Minneapolis to pull the Twins within a run of the Tigers in the eighth inning. Sanó then had the game-tying hit in the ninth before Byron Buxton beat out a walkoff infield single....
The Mourning After: Gruden Gonna Gruden, MLS Gonna MLS & MLB Gonna Step on More Rakes
We’ll start with the truly weird, or at least it would be if it weren’t the world of football coaches. We should have guessed that some coach would have taken the situation in the world and used it to perform some sort of deluded, self-designed Rorschach test on their own team. Which is exactly what...
Ain’t a Sheet of Ice North of Fargo I Ain’t Played: NHL’s Return Preview – Eastern Conference
The winter sports and their summer bubbles return to us this weekend, because we’re descending into the Upside-Down. The NHL has decamped to Toronto and Edmonton, with a modified playoff system kicking straight off on Saturday. It’s a bit run-before-you-can-walk, with each team only getting one pres...
Maple Leafs' Auston Matthews Charged With Disorderly Conduct Over Late-Night Mooning Incident
Auston Matthews, Toronto’s 22-year-old center, has a pretrial conference scheduled for Wednesday morning in Scottsdale, Arizona, related to a strange incident alleged to have taken place in a condominium complex at 2 a.m. back in May. Matthews, who may have been intoxicated at the time, is accused o...
How Early Is Too Early To Be Nervous About Mitch Marner?
Everything is fine in Toronto, because training camp doesn’t even start for another few weeks. But ... is it really? The negotiations between the Maple Leafs and their wunderkind RFA winger Mitch Marner have, perhaps unsurprisingly, plodded through the offseason with minimal progress, or at least wi...