If you, like me, bought into what the Toronto Maple Leafs were selling for the last six years, then perhaps you also think they had a terrible trade deadline.
With several superstar players up for grabs, the Toronto Maple Leafs went old-school instead, and failed to live up to the courage of their convictions, reverting back to the kind of magical thinking that permeates the NHL and stops progress in its tracks.
In the NHL, there is a myth about playoff hockey and what it takes to win. The Leafs went all-in on talent and skill at the beginning of the Kyle Dubas era, and they seemed to eschew fighters, stay-at-home defencemen, and grinders, while focusing on underlying numbers over results.