West Coast Woes - They’ve Outdone Themselves Again!
“Just wait until Toskala comes back!”
How many times did we all hear that? It seems like the unenlightened were certain that the Leafs current troubles would turn around when Leafs goalie Jesus Chr…I mean Vesa Toskala returned from injury. Afterall, Toskala is the greatest thing since sliced bread and is without question a high calibre starting goalie! Right? Right? So what was the result of Vesa Christ’s triumphant return to the ice?
5-0 Ducks. What a bum.
But wait! I can hear it now. “Some of those goals weren’t his fault! You can’t just blame him!” Well for the record, blame is to be shared with the entire team. However, it’s delicious to revel in the disappointment of the Leafs faithful at the utter failure of their Messianic ‘tender. The guy let in 5 goals on 24 freaking shots. THAT is the big off season solution to last year goaltending woes? This bum?
It’s amazing that after acquiring one completely unproven goaltender and watching him fail, the Leafs management decided the best way to remedy the situation was to do it again! Let me remind everyone, Vesa Toskala is a BACKUP goaltender! The guy is 30 years old and has never once in his career played more than 40 games.
I’ll give him credit for playing well in the games that he has played in, but the fact of the matter remains, he’s never once in his career held a starting job for a full season and when he was playing, he was playing on a San Jose team FAR more talented than this years Leafs. Add to that he has minimal playoff experience (again playing for a far more talented team), and overall what you have is a guy who has never really seen enough rubber in an entire season to prove that hes a quality starting goalie. Did I mention he’s 30?
Vesa Toskala is not a BAD goalie. But he is not even close to the goaltending solution that the Laughs need if they plan to make it to the playoffs. Not with the team they’ve assembled in front of them. Grant Fuhr, Felix Potvin, Curtis Joseph, Ed Belfour, Andrew Raycroft, Vesa Toskala. Hmmm, a couple names just don’t seem to fit on that list.
Let’s face it Laughs fans, to go into the playoffs and drive for the cup, you need All-Star goaltending. That’s one place the Leafs always had a pretty good fix on things. But when you follow up a list of All-Stars with names like Andrew Raycroft and Vesa Toskala, can you really expect anything different than what you’ve been seeing the last two years?
Stumble it!
