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It’s been reported by everyone and their brother that Cliff Fletcher was recently in talks with Ron Wilson regarding contract negotiations for Wilson to sign on as the Leafs new coach. While there is no problem with hiring Ron Wilson as the coach, he’s a fine coach, the problem is that Fletcher is the guy doing the hiring.

Fletcher is the interim General Manager, and he said himself that the hiring of the new coach would be left up to the teams new permanant GM. Unfortunately for Cliff, the incompetent organization he’s affiliated with hasn’t been able to find a new GM, or President, and as such, Cliff is stuck trying to find a coach for this awful team.

I don’t know if I’m just being negative, but to me it isn’t a good sign that the Leafs have managed to screw up the very first step of their ‘rebuild’, namely find a General Manager who will find a coach and then start working on the team.

Two possibilities exist. Either 1) the Leafs are holding off, hoping to god that trader Cliff will stick around full time or 2) the management side of the organization really is completely useless, and haven’t even been able to find someone who could do a better job than the last guy, which in reality makes about 90% of the population a candidate.

I see another fun season on the horizon.

Upon the hiring of Cliff Fletcher, MLSE did what they always do and held a press conference. First Peddie spoke about their plan for the future and a bit about Cliff, and then Fletcher took the mic. This is when the interesting part began. As Fletcher was reading from his notes, Peddie began to mouth the words along with him. This means one of two things. Either a) Peddie wrote Fletcher’s statement or b) Peddie had to read it and approve it. The fact he had it memorized by heart leads me to believe he either wrote it himself or dictated what would go in it.

This is a bad sign Leafs fans. One of the big things Peddie has been preaching recently is that Fletcher has autonomy and can make decisions without interfering. In fact on Bob Mcown’s show on the Fan 590 today, Peddie reasserted that Ferguson had the same autonomy. Right. How can we believe that he’s giving his new GM autonomy and the final say on team related decisions when (more…)

On Tuesday the Leafs officially announced that John Ferguson Jr. had been relieved of his duties, and that Cliff Fletcher would be signing on as interim General Manager. Fans and media have been calling for Ferguson’s head for some time now, after the Toronto Maple Leafs missed the playoffs two years in a row and are now poised to miss for a third time. The real kicker is that this year’s Leafs won’t likely miss by one place, but are on pace to finish near the bottom of the entire league!

Ferguson is replaced by Cliff Fletcher, a seasoned hockey man who spent a stint with the Leafs in the 90’s that most people would consider to be a rather successful one. While Fletcher’s Leafs never won a Stanley Cup, they did advance to the Conference Finals twice. Fletcher was also responsible for some big moves in the franchise, including bringing up prospect Felix Potvin, who became an All-Star goaltender for the team and acquiring stars such as Doug Gilmour and Mats Sundin.

While Fletcher brings great hockey knowledge and years of experience to the team, two problems still loom. First, (more…)

We’d all love to see this team dismantled and sent out to scrap like the jalopy it is, but I think one thing not enough people touch on is that the problems facing this team go higher than the guys on the ice, higher than Paul Maurice, higher than John Ferguson Jr. and even higher than Richard Peddie. In fact every level of this organization is in a state of unrecoverable funk right up to the majority owners, the Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan.

Sure the guys on the ice are the ones directly losing the game, and sure Maurice hasn’t shown he can improve a lesser team (something all great coaches can do), and JFJ is a bum, and Peddie is a moron. However, what are we to do when the majority owners are equally as awful as every branch of the tree stemming from them?

The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan is a nameless, faceless owner that the unfortunate reality is, has one goal and one goal only. They want to beef up their pension fund. They want a return on their investment. Anything on top of that is nice, but the fact of the matter is, the “owner” of this team doesn’t yearn for a championship, it yearns for a safe retirement.

The Leafs need an owner, who like a Steinbrener or a Cuban, is (more…)