Mailbag: No Clubs Going Up

The Sun is setting, the summer is approaching, and it’s a Tuesday night. Time to party, right? Nah. I’m not ILoveMakkonen. Mannequins are weird, and I spent enough time near them at a hair convention this weekend. Drake is busy with the Raptors. We’re just going to go with the mailbag instead. Like we do every Tuesday. Except for the 99% of the Mailbags that were posted on Monday. Uhh, lets start.

It’ll be sooner than later. Obviously, teams are hesitant to make moves until the season actually concludes, but I imagine that the Leafs will be one of the first teams involved when things begin to happen in the next week and change. They have pieces that they’d like to sell and I’m sure they’re looking at this as a pivotal draft year for them, so getting a head start is vital.

The Toronto Marlies are named after the Toronto Marlboros, a team that started off (before the Leafs!) as an all purpose atheltic club, and evolved into a flagship Junior A hockey club, before folding in 1989. The Marlboros name didn’t go away, however; their multi-tiered minor hockey organization has developed a ton of high profile players over the years.

The logical question at that point is “what the hell is a Marlboro, then?”. Well, it’s not a cigarette, despite the intitial thoughts of many. The team was named after the Duke of Marlborough. This is also why “Duke the Dog” is the Marlies’ mascot. 

A few years back, an NHL team drafted a player out of Europe. He seemed interesting, but was considered a long shot. He battled through some good leagues, impressed some people, but for several years, showed no indication that he’d play in the league. 

A few years after everyone gave up on him, he showed up and played for one of their minor league affiliates. He felt like he wasn’t growing and that there was more money in Europe, so he left.

He came back a few months later, won the hearts of the local fans, left again when his team didn’t want to give him the opportunity he felt he deserved, and then eventually came back one more time, this time in a long-term capacity.

His name was Leo Komarov. Anything can happen.

If Mike Babcock is truely and significantly better than his predecessors? They need a goalie to go on a hot streak and a few players to have some hot sticks. That’s it. The Leafs aren’t inherently terrible yet and I don’t think there’s a significant gap between them and the Flames in the present day.

However, this is a team that wants to win a Stanley Cup in a few years, not squeak into the playoffs on a PDO-driven tear. They won’t take the Calgary aproach. It may not be as severe as Buffalo’s, but they won’t try to build Rome with scrap heaps.

I’d be okay with it. He’s a big body and his numbers are pretty decent. He obviously has a reputation that has people very excited for him, and could very well be a diamond in the rough.

We’re talking about the 24th overall pick, right?