Patrick Marleau scores in Sharks return while Leafs lose to Lightning, nothing really matters in the end

While the Leafs lose a disaster of a game to the Tampa Bay Lightning, ex-Leaf Patrick Marleau scores in his first game since signing with his original team on a one-year deal.

Sometimes the world is just cruel and wants everyone to know how much things can go wrong at any moment.

If losing 7-3 to a team they hope to be somewhere close to after all 82 regular season games are finished, isn’t bad enough, a 40-year-old winger that they had to pay a hefty price of their 2020 first-round draft pick to get rid of, scoring within the first period of his season debut is just a dagger through the heart.

Toronto had to give the Carolina Hurricanes their first-round selection for an upcoming draft — that is supposed to be stacked to the brim with young talent — just so that they can buy out the remaining $6.25-million on his contract.

He then of course signed a one-year, $700,000 contract with his only other team that he’s played with and promptly destroyed all hopes and dreams of Leafs fans heading into the weekend.

It’s some unusual punishment to see a signing that was made fun of and analysts talking about how this signing is a negative one, to then just have the exact opposite effect in his first game since being bought out this summer.

The Leafs will lose in the first round to the Bruins and the Sharks will finally win their first Stanley Cup as a franchise with Marleau scoring the game-winning goal. It’s decided.