Let me make one thing clear: The last thing Maple Leaf Nation needs is raised expectations. Having said that, I now submit that Toronto’s season opener victory Thursday evening was an unequivocal tragedy. Not only did the Leafs shock the champion Red Wings in Detroit on the night the Wings raised their Stanley Cup banner, but they did so with an effort and enthusiasm that may have shocked some fans to death. At least two men were rushed to one Toronto hospital (not so far from Woodbridge) with vital signs absent and similar stories: each had keeled over in his chair while watching the Leafs game. Their wives had called ambulances. Both men died. So. A moment of loud noise, please . . .
Thank you. Now I will rip into the Leafs for raising a certain cultural entity’s expectations with Thursday evening’s victory. Those stupid selfish inconsiderate boneheaded sons of bitches. What were they thinking? Oh, they’ve gone and done it, all right. I see the hope in people’s eyes and sprightly step, I hear it in their voices and laughter, I feel it in their handshakes, the sad cruel hope that maybe this year won’t be so bad after all. Now, hope is never in short supply in Leaf Nation. And hope is certainly not a bad thing. But hope raises expectations. Especially in Leaf Nation. And this year more than most, well, expectations nurtured in Leaf Nation will more than likely be shit on, gang-raped, bayonetted, and fed to the crocodiles. I’m not an alarmist, I’m a realist. Maybe a bit of a sensationalist. Anyway Ron Wilson publicly lowered the bar for a reason. To put it kindly, the 2008-09 Toronto Maple Leafs consist of many unproven parts. How can you expect anything from a club that replaces its core players — core players on a mediocre club, remember — with a bunch of guys no one’s ever heard of? But then they go out and beat the Wings at Joe Louis Arena, thus stirring their masochistic bipolar fans into a flash frenzy of hope and raised expectations. And of course the higher they rise, the farther they fall. Right now, Leaf Nation has been falling for about forty-two years.
Though you know what I can’t get out of my head? The Leafs won by doing something Pat Quinn and Paul Maurice couldn’t or wouldn’t make them do, something I haven’t seen the club do in ten years: base their game around defensive conscientiousness. They worked hard, they checked, they showed speed, tenacity, determination, discipline, youthful hunger, and they protected a lead. They basically erased any memory of the Leafs of the last decade. For one night, anyway. I can’t remember the last game I saw where the Leafs weren’t once hemmed in their own zone for minutes on end. They played enthusiastic, energetic hockey. Trap hockey, but inspired. With the solid if not spectacular goaltending they’ve generally received all decade. At times their forecheck made the Detroit D look bad, for godsake. When did the Leafs last manage that against any team, much less Detroit? Though I wouldn’t start saying “Mats who?” just yet. One huge question needs answering: who’s going to score goals?
You aren’t supposed to be good, Leafs. You’re a flowerbed with all the weeds cleared. New seeds planted, with intentions of acquiring more new seeds. We’ll see what grows. If you guys play inspired like you did Thursday, I’ll actually look forward to watching. The last couple years, I sooner would’ve watched ice melt. And you guys must also do one other thing, in two parts. Make amends by losing your own home opener tonight against Montreal. And please guys, for the sake of Leaf Nation’s fragile psyche, by all means play your games hard and tough and disciplined, make them if not entertaining then at least exciting for Leafs fans to watch. Just don’t win. We need those high draft picks. And besides, you don’t want to kill any more fans.
