- The Toronto Star counted 35 names gone from last season’s 130-person Maple Leafs staff directory
- Toronto is down to two assistant GMs after carrying five a year ago
- Read below for who is out, who came in, and what a former NHL GM makes of John Chayka’s methods
John Chayka spent his first summer running the Maple Leafs emptying out the building.
Kevin McGran of the Toronto Star went through Toronto’s staff directory and counted 35 names from last season’s 130-person list who are no longer on it. That is more than a quarter of the front office and support staff, wiped out in a few months.
Not all of it was Chayka. Brad Treliving was fired March 30, assistant coach Marc Savard was let go mid-season, and senior adviser Cliff Fletcher died June 5. Media relations staffer Jennifer Redenbach left on her own for a job at Tennis Canada.
Everything else was. Chayka was hired May 3 and fired Craig Berube 10 days later. By July 10, the executives most associated with the Shanaplan era were out the door.
Neil Smith, a former NHL general manager who hosts the “NHL Wraparound” podcast, was asked how unusual a clear-out like this really is.
“It’s not that different than politics. When the new president comes in, everybody from the old president is gone.”
Smith has sat in that chair himself, and he still could not get his arms around the scale of this one.
“It’s unfathomable to me, this whole Leaf thing. I’ve been very surprised at a lot of the things they’ve done. But if you scratch the surface (Chayka) is not doing anything conventionally, he’s not doing anything for brownie points. He’s charting his own course. He’s doing it his way.”
The July wave alone took Hayley Wickenheiser, Darryl Metcalf and nine others, including most of the analytics group. Terry Koshan of the Toronto Sun ran the names that afternoon:
Toronto carried five assistant GMs last season and will open camp with two. Ryan Hardy is the only holdover, and winning a Calder Cup with the Marlies did not hurt his case. Brandon Pridham resurfaced in Pittsburgh, Derek Clancey and Wickenheiser are gone, and Judd Brackett arrived in June with a title nobody in Toronto had before him.
He is also hiring people he has no history with. Jeremiah Crowe spent nine years rebuilding Buffalo and had no prior connection to Chayka before the phone rang:
Two groups came through untouched. The 12-person medical staff under Dr. Noah Forman survived, and so did the five equipment men led by Bobby Hastings, who started in Toronto in 2001.
One more detail from the new directory: Chayka’s name sits above Mats Sundin’s. The Hall of Famer is a senior executive adviser, and the outsider who last ran the Arizona Coyotes is the one who answers for all 35 of those names.
