Simultaneous Transactions

Interesting that Pat Quinn and Bryan McCabe would be in the news in the same week.

Once, the two men were key collaborators in the attempt to bring the Stanley Cup back to Toronto. Quinn played the heck out of McCabe, turned him into a Leaf blueline workhorse, and McCabe responded with his best NHL seasons.

Then the star faded for both men in Toronto. Now Quinn has got a new coaching gig, and McCabe a new hockey home.

First Quinn. Clearly the man wants to coach again in the NHL, and it's surprising he hasn't received a chance. You have to be impressed that his gigantic ego didn't get in the way of taking first the under-18 Canadian coaching job last winter, the 2006 Spengler Cup and now the reins of the Canadian national junior team for this year's world championships in Ottawa.

He won gold with the under-18s and silver at the tricky Spengler, more international hardware to go with his gold medal from the 2002 Winter Olympics and championship work from the 2004 World Cup.

Maybe these competitions are Quinn's calling, even more than NHL work.

After all, it's curious that in a quarter-century of coaching in the NHL with Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Vancouver and Toronto, often with very good teams at his disposal, the 65-year-old Hamilton native didn't win a damn thing.

But when in charge of a Canadian entry for a tournament, he's almost a lock, with the dismal finish of the country at the 2006 Olympics the only major blemish on his international coaching record, a result that probably had more to do with some very questionable player selections.

By the end with the Leafs, he was the wrong man for the job. But in short tournament-type events, however, he commands immediate respect, and it could be where his straightforward, simple message of skating and puck control works best. Moreover, with no fighting in these international events, Quinn's worst bully instincts don't bubble to the surface.

He certainly deserves credit for not thinking the under-18 posting or the national junior job are beneath his dignity at this stage of his long career. The focus on Team Canada at the world juniors in Ottawa will be excruciating, and he's certainly handled the limelight before.

Now a little more on McCabe.

In responses to this blog and a column in The Star this week, some took offence at my suggestions that this deal that sent McCabe to Florida was less than a brilliant transaction for the Leafs. Some suggested that it was a flip-flop on my part to suggest for a number of years that McCabe had played below his abilities and was overpaid, but then to argue that when he was dealt, the trade wasn't good enough.

Well, that's not a flip-flop at all.

To say McCabe needed to be shipped out of town is one point. But then you don't just give him away. It's ridiculous to say any deal, no matter how it was structured, was a good one for the Leafs to make and to disagree is a flip-flop.

Well, if the Leafs had thrown in Tomas Kaberle along with McCabe and fourth rounder, would that have been a good deal for Toronto? Of course not.

Maybe there wasn't more out there. But maybe there was, and the Leafs were unwilling to wait patiently as the season progressed to find a trading partner because they were obsessed with moving McCabe for public relations reasons.

It's interesting, for example, to compare the Leafs trade of McCabe to Florida and Tampa's deal with San Jose that made Dan Boyle a Shark.

McCabe and Boyle aren't identical commodities. Boyle is two years younger, but like McCabe, received an outlandish contract from the Lightning before being dealt, a six-year, $40 million extension that could prove to be one of those millstone-like contracts to have on the books. Like McCabe, Boyle had a no-trade provision in his deal.

Like McCabe, Boyle has been bothered by injuries the past two years, hurting his production to some degree.

But while the Leafs had to throw in a draft pick and swallow McCabe's $2 million bonus just to get overpaid, 29-year-old Mike Van Ryn (two more years at $3.35 million) out of the Panthers, the Lightning, in exchange for Boyle, received promising 23-year-old blueliner Matt Carle, San Jose's 2006 first round pick Ty Wishart, a first round pick next June and a fourth rounder in 2010.

That's a promising package of youth and picks.

Again, McCabe and Boyle aren't exactly the same commodity. But they're not completely different, either. In fact, McCabe's significantly cheaper for the next three years.

So sure, McCabe had to go. But couldn't the Leafs have done better?

And if the cap room gained over time by the deletion of McCabe is really the main gain and the driving philosophy of the Leaf organization behind the swap, why would the team be offering Mats Sundin multiple years at $7 million or more, thus swallowing up much of that cap room if Sundin were to accept?

The name of the game for the Leafs shouldn't just be accumulating cap room. It should be accumulating prospects and draft picks, something more difficult to do when you're trading draft picks at the rate Cliff Fletcher has been in recent months and all but giving away former all-star defencemen.

Comments

[Heaton]

Good point in comparing McCabe's trade with Boyle's trade. The key difference however is that McCabe publicly (via his agent) refused to waive his NMC at the trade deadline last season unlike Boyle who understood it was necessary to waive his NTC even though the ink had yet to dry on his six year contract.

McCabe's stubbon refusal to waive his NMC put Fleth in no win situation. During the summer an already thin market for McCabe was getting thinner.

McCabe lasted this long a Leaf (7 seasons) only because maroon JFJ extended him. McCabe does seem to wear out his welcome fairly quickly (NYI, Vancover and Chicago before joining Leafs).

[Ian]

Damien, I commend you for addressing the backlash you received from your article. Most writers won't. However, again, I'm going to have to disagree with you. The Leafs got what they could for McCabe. First of all, McCabe has a no-trade clause, so, the number of teams he would accept a trade to is probably only a few. He's a shell of his former self, and the Leafs got what they could. I really don't believe they could have gotten more, and quite frankly, they wanted him out quickly, so they could move on and not have an ugly mess with not playing him, etc.

[Brad Mitchell]

Talk about a desperate attempt to backtrack!
Comparing McCabe to Boyle?!?! Coxy, it's time for you to go the way of Culpepper and hang them up. You don't even make sense anymore! Not that you ever did.
McCabe and Boyle are at least a full class apart. Boyle doesn't cough up the puck on a regular basis, unlike McCabe. And Boyle is significantly better offensively, as indicated by his .56 career PPG average - almost 22% higher than McCabe's.

It is also so infuriating to read the most egotistical sports writer of all time actually having the audacity to refer to Pat Quinn's "gigantic ego." Cox - wake up and look in a mirror yfdb - you have the biggest ego of all time ! So perhaps you should refrain from throwing stones.

[OddyOh]

McCabe had become useless...he has no value. I'm surprised Fletch got what he did.

[michael Sanderson]

Could they have done better???? Yeah, keep him and get a coach/system to HELP McCabe back to the 67 pt. producer that he was .He didn't become a 6.7$ M man by fluke and he didn't become useless by the same fluke. Atheletes need coaches- they motivate players to play at their potential. McCabe was productive under which coach?? Quinn? under Maurice , am I wrong or did the whole team kinda suck?

[michael Sanderson]

I'm an athelete. Bike +10,000k/season alpine ski 130 days. I'm a coach -teach/motivate skiers and cyclists. When they don't perform to their potential , whose fault do I think it is?? Theirs?? I don't coach useless atheletes.......... my methods are becoming ineffective. They didn't lose their talent, someone failed to harness that talent........do you get that?

[Montgomery Burns]

A poor trade for the Leafs, yes, but McCabe dictated where he wanted to be dealt and the Panthers dictated the terms of the deal.

The Leafs could have sat McCabe for a few months until a team ran into injury problems on its 'D' or until he caved and would accept trades to other teams. However, one has to wonder how much of a distraction or negative influence McCabe would have had whether he was lingering in the team dressing room or press box.

A quick fix but possibly a necessary one at that.

[Mario]

Damien:

You are wrong about McCabe. He still had and has a no trade clause so Cliff's hands were tied to begin with. I am glad he was traded since this will free up a lot of cap room and who knows Van Ryn can still be dealt away.

The most important thing is for the Leafs to get younger and hopefully get a high draft pick

[sproutlore]

Pat Quinn was successful everywhere he coached. He got Philadelphia and Vancouver to the final and with a break here or there (Tie doesn't goon Neidermeyer, Sundin isn't hurt for Carolina) Toronto would have joined them. He transformed the Mike Murphy coached team from a team afraid to go past the redline, to a dynamic and entertaining one. Sure, his time was done at the end of 6 years, but that's not the signal of coach who's act wears thin, but of a General Manager over his head (Quinn was right, again).
Yet the constant rant by a good selection of the press is that Pat Quinn's time with the Leafs was a complete failure: there was no enjoyable hockey, no teams that won far more than they lost, no runs in the playoff, nothing but a wasteland of incompetance, ego struggles and greed (ok, some of that is true).
I don't remember it that way, especially in comparison with the last couple of years.
So why this animosity towards Quinn? I think it's because Quinn was quite comfortable letting the clustered press know that he was smarter than they were, that they knew nothing about the actual working of a sports team and even less about hockey. And enough of this was true to really set a bunch of you off and so it's Quinn's ego, Quinn's bluster, Quinn's bullying and Quinn's failure every other sentence (again, some of this is true, I'm sure).
Time to move on.

[Scot Loucks]

Some of you .... including you Damien should pay more attention to other media.

First .... McCabe interview with Kypreos... McCabe agreed to two teams NYR and Florida Panthers. Once NYR signed Redden it was down to one.

Second..... The draft pick was payback for the 3rd rounder Florida gave up for Kilger... who pulled a no show.

Third.... McCabe stated in the interview with Kypreos that he never refused to be traded. He told Cliff he was open to offers. Apparently there were none. (Do you think the same could have been said for Boyle Damien?

As for Quinn... I take it Quinn didn't like you Damien... I can certainly understand why.

Cheers

[Pat Vaughan]

It's not interesting that Quinn and McCabe are in the news in the same week. Actually it is tired and time to move on. McCabe and Kilger (4th round pick Cliffie got for the hanging Chad) for nothing sounds like a good deal to me. Addition by subtraction. Comparing the Boyle trade to the McCabe trade is ridiculous. There are so many variables and human factors involved in these two situations. San Jose thinks they are on the cusp; so they will overpay for a perceived last missing piece. The Leafs and Panthers are door mats; they are just exchanging rubble and dead wood; it gives the impression that things are happening with the team moving forward. You never know Mike Van Ryn under the coaching of Ron Wilson could turn out to be a useful player. Nobody really knows what's going to happen. Anyhow Damien I don't think you are ready to take the keys to the GM's office at ACC. It's like the stocks game ... sometimes you just have to take your losses and move on.

[Alex]

Ah, controversy in leaf land! I love it!!!

Welcome back Cox! I don't know how you put up with us!

[chris]

Great to see you back, Damien.

As for Quinn, he succeeded in Toronto because of the goaltending he got, first from Joseph then from Belfour. Pure and simple. The only thing he was smart enough to create was the term "upper body ailment", the biggest joke in hockey. He's the Bill Belichick of hockey, minus the championships. Perhaps you dopes all think he was the greatest thing to hit the Toronto Maple Leafs since Punch Imlach. But since the only goal of Leaf Nation is to see their Blue and White parade Lord Stanley's cup around Toronto, Quinn was every bit as successful as John Brophy.

[Rocky Dundas]

McCabe had a no-trade clause. Yet he was just traded. What does that say about those clauses? They are a joke.

[Derek]

Damien,
Your comparison is a good one and makes the Leafs look foolish. McCabe has saod he would have look @ options proposed by the Leafs. Surely, they could waited McCabe out. Play him during the season and let him experience how awful the team will look before peddling him off at the trade deadline. His play could not have got far worse, so playing him next season could have been a way to increase his value. They had the option of sending him home if that didn't work. The Leafs were not willing to use their own leverage to get a better deal Van Ryn, maybe a good player, is not something the Leafs needed. Florida was forcing his salary on the Leafs.

Based on this deal, it would have been better for the Leafs to keep him. They are not even close to the cap. Whats a few dollars?

[Clark]

Quinn was ahead of his time when he took over the Leafs. The freewheeling style he put into place, led by Sundin and CuJo in their primes, would have been an incredible success in today's NHL.

Think back to those playoff teams and the teams that put them out of the playoffs. The 99 Sabres, the 00 & 01 Devils, the 02 Canes, the 03 & 04 Flyers.

They all eliminated those Leafs teams using a clutch and grab defensive style that would have seen the Leafs on the powerplay the entire game under the current rules. I am amazed nobody has given Quinn another opportunity. Imagine him running Atlanta? Kovalchuk would score 60 goals easily in a system built on speed and offence where he didn't have to play a lick of defence.

As for McCabe, he's never going to approach the 50 point plateau again because he will never reach the same PP point totals he did before. Every team in the league knows his PP value stems from his shot, and they all just key in on him. His penchant for giveaways, bad passes, and poor pinches limits him from really being a defenceman you can rely on for 30 mistake-free minutes. Plus, he's 33, and on the downside of his career.

I think that Florida was the wrong team for this trade, simply because Florida didn't have players that really matched our needs. Van Ryn, if healthy, should be part of the top 4 along with Kaberle, Kubina and Colaiacavo. But we've also got Finger, White, and a number of young D who need to start getting significant ice time. Somebody like the Islanders or St. Louis would have been a much better fit.

[Roberto]

While it's true Quinn has never won a Cup, his Leaf teams certainly were better than either his predecessor (Mike Murphy) or his succesor (Paul Maurice) could manage. You can look it up.
The fact that Quinn had disdain for the "sheep" who follow the team and write predictable negative rants about everything MLSE did caused many writers to speak harshly about the guy, especially Cox. How transparent.
All I can tell you is when Quinn was coaching we had mostly good teams. Now a playoff spot is years away and being a contender is a pipe dream.

[Andrew Barrie]

I used to be a huge McCabe Fan. But I was pretty fed up with his play the last couple of seasons, and just the though of how much cap space he was taking up.

A part of me is sad to see him go. I was hoping for a turn around in play. That might have happened if Fletch had given him a until December/January of the upcoming season to turn his game around, either to stay, or attract better trade bait.

Yes McCabe had all the power in terms of trading partners, but if he was only playing 8-12 minutes a game... unless he showed he deserved a lot more (in which case we keep him for sure) he might have increased his destination options enough for that good deal trade Cox thinks could have been found.

Maybe it could have, just not under these circumstances.

[Sean]

I would of traded a McCabe for a bag of used pucks!!!

We should be lucky to have someone coming in return, he was another one of JFJ's trigger happy signings just because he had one good year.

Damien, the whole point of re-building is to cut loose your dead weight, and get younger and have the resources to go after more skill, isn't that what Cliff had promised? He looks like he's doing that.

[j derry]

i agree with your column had the leafs not been in such a rush to trade McCabe to save some face they might have been able to get more later in the season i am also a little puzzled by the trading away of future draft picks no matter what round or year they are in they are suppose to be in rebuilding mode and it becomes a hard sell when your trading away your future and still offering Mats a contract and i really hoping he ends up back in Toronto good grief the more things change the more they stay the same in leaf land curses!

[maxie]

Firstly, I am a Leafs fan. Secondly, I agree with Damien. Apparently some of the respondents thought they were letting Damien and the rest of us on a big secret - that McCabe had a no trade clause. Ah, we all knew that.

Its ironic in that Fletcher and Peddie likely feel pressure to make such assinine deals BECAUSE of the attitude of fans. That attitude comes across loud and clear here. "Fix it now. Why undergo radical surgery and long term rehab when a bandaid will keep the masses happy." Me, I woulda dressed McCabe and used him sparingly. When he inevitably coughed the puck up, I'd nail his butt to the end of the bench. The boo birds would finish him off. Cruel? Heck, no! We needn't feel sorry for McCabe. He just received a "get out of town card with a 2 million dollar bonus". He'll be alright. In fact, I hope he gets his career on track. I just wish the Leafs had Matt Carle instead of Van Ryn. Oh, almost forgot - we got that Finger guy. Fletch and Peddie say he's gonna be great! I feel better now.

[John Hunt]

Leaf fans are like the cute girl who gives it up solely on the promise that there may be love down the road.

Fletcher, Peddie, MLSE and the clowns running the Ontario Teachers Pension Fund regularly insult our intelligence and all we do is tell them what a great job they are doing.

Cox is absolutely right. We are supposed to be rebuilding, and Fletcher is sending out draft picks like packs of gum. We have been promised the best of everything, and yet, because the "organization" cannot get out of its own way, we are saddled with retreads at GM and coach. Every fan seems proud of our depth, but we haven't had one meaningful contribution from a rookie since Sergie Berezin, and every hockey publication has concluded that our prospects as a group are near the bottom. And to top it off, there are morons out there who actually think that all this cap space represents some good in its own right.

I love the Leafs (my wife thinks more than her), but I hate being insulted, even by them. Unless more of you start feeling the same, and expressing it, we are going to treated by the team as nothing more than a cheap date.

[Matt Morrison]

Damian,
Maybe there was more out there for McCabe, maybe not. However, to suggest that the Leafs couldve gotten anywhere close to what the Bolts got for Boyle is just crazy-talk. Everyone in or around the NHL knew that McCabe was going to be moved, everyone also knew he controlled his own destiny. Both of those things alone are enough to bring down his return in a trade. Sure, the Leafs handled it wrong getting into a public fight with him, which I agree certainly brought down his value a fair bit more. But the Bolts landed a ridiculous return for Boyle, in my opinion they lucked out big-time. If the Leafs had lucked out, maybe they could've done that deal for MVR alone (without the pick). But, to get much more than that is a stretch I think. Finally, McCabe, like the rest of the five, just had to go. They owned the dressing room, and couldn't get it done, and then refused to go anywhere when changes were necessary. Every team in the league knew that the Leafs were going to get rid of him, whether this summers spectacle happened or not. I agree with you that trading the 4th pick was a mistake; but, on the flipside, the Leafs have great depth on the 4-5-6 d-positions. They could easily (and my guess is probably) trade one or two of those guys and get back some of the picks they have lost before the deadline.

[rob]

Scot Loucks-Thanks for saying it, it seems like no one saw the interview with kippy.

One big difference we are fogetting between a comparison with McCabe and Boyle

STANLEY CUP WINNER...you can't underestimate what that does for a GM when dealing with other teams

[Tabber]

michael Sanderson, I'd love to be an athlete under your training, I wouldn't have to take any responsibility for my own failures. You must train professional athletes, pampered since childhood and no responsibilities to do anything except count their money. You, sir, are an enabler for your trainees and are doing them no favours letting them off the hook as you describe.