Simmons Says – the usual collections of thoughts, dots and shots

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When the Marlies won the 2018 AHL championship in Toronto, I walked out of the arena with a high-ranking official from the Dallas Stars.

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I asked him how he felt about losing to the Marlies. He said he was OK with it, considering the disparity in budget between the two teams.

It was his belief that Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment spent at least twice as much on the Marlies as Dallas did on its AHL team. Which is how the Maple Leafs are basically perceived throughout the hockey world.

They have more money — buy nice things, have more front office people in more positions with more toys — and sometimes it pays off, as it did in winning an AHL title. But as Sheldon Keefe said recently — in a quote that was wildly misinterpreted by those who have a never met a GM or talked privately to an NHL coach — the Leafs live in their own little hockey world.

The rest of the league looks at them kind of funny, either with resentment or as being slightly spoiled or somewhat incompetent. The rest of the league cheers quietly — and sometimes not that quietly — when the Leafs continually fail.

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Now, Keefe, with his words and in the words of coaches he spoke to, enters into the real NHL with the New Jersey Devils organization. Where money sometimes can be tight. Where extravagance is something other teams experience.

The ‘real NHL’ has little to do with media coverage, a giant-sized fan base, or any rant that may have accompanied Keefe’s surprising words.

What the new Devils coach was really saying, as were his colleagues, is that he is now coaching in the rest of the league. The rest of the league is pretty much every team except Toronto.

THIS AND THAT

One giant aspect of Leafs Nation: Its fan base. Right across the country. Game 7 of the Leafs-Boston series obliterated television ratings for the rest of the playoffs across Canada. Edmonton’s series against the Canucks and now the Stars, are being watched by a significantly smaller audience than watched the Leafs in Round 1 … Another giant aspect of Leafs Nation: Overkill. At the press conference to announce the hiring of coach Craig Berube, there were seven media relations people or consultants on hand, four from the team, two from the front office, one from MLSE. Roger Goodell does press conferences with half that staff … An NHL GM on the Mitch Marner situation: “It’s all Fantasy Island stuff” right now. It’s fodder for guessing websites and talk radio. There is interest in Marner. There have been no serious talks with teams or with Marner’s camp or anything beyond made-up speculation … If I were Max Domi and I wanted to stay with the Leafs, I’d find myself a new agent. The numbers being floated around for Domi don’t fit what the Leafs will be looking at. The Leafs’ priority is to improve goaltending and defence. You can’t do that if you’re throwing too much money for too much term at players such as Domi or Tyler Bertuzzi … How do you get better on defence? Sometimes you have to be lucky. Florida claimed Gustav Forsling off waivers from Carolina (thank you, Don Waddell). He’s turned out great. They traded a third-round pick to get Brandon Montour from Buffalo. Those are two top-four defenceman coming at a very inexpensive price … Florida wants to re-sign Montour who is a pending free agent, as is the 50-goal scorer Sam Reinhart. The thinking is, the Panthers will look to trade veteran Aaron Ekblad at the end of the season and use his money to keep Montour. Reinhart may sign a tax-friendly deal brought to you by the state of Florida … If the Stanley Cup final ends up as Edmonton versus Florida, consider this: The Panthers are the most penalized team in the NHL. The Oilers have the best power play. Will the Panthers be able to play their roughhouse style against Edmonton and avoid taking penalties, or will they take them and find a way to kill them?

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HEAR AND THERE

Davis Schneider is the Blue Jays’ MVP through the first third of this season, which is great if you happen to be Davis Schneider. Not so great if you’re the Blue Jays or fans of the Jays … Alek Manoah is getting a second opinion on his bum elbow, which is another way of saying: ‘See you next year’ … The Jays are coming to the end of the really easy part of their schedule without making any real inroads in the standings. They were 11.5 games behind the Yankees on May 19 and were 11.5 games behind them heading into Saturday’s game against Pittsburgh. They were 9.5 games behind Baltimore on May 19 and are 9.5 games behind them on Saturday. They were 4.5 games behind four teams in the wild-card race and were 4.5 games behind. In other words, 11 days and some easy schedule later and they are no closer to anything that matters in the standings … Something to hold on to for the desperate: The great 2015 Blue Jays team that reinvigorated baseball across Canada, didn’t start so great. It was 26-30 after 56 games, one game behind the current team. Those Jays finished winning 67 of their final 106 games … How much will the Atlanta Braves miss Ronald Acuna Jr., out for the season with a knee injury? All he did last season was lead the National League in plate appearances, at-bats, hits, stolen bases, on-base percentage, OPS and total bases. Losing Acuna is like losing three players … Ricky Tiedemann, with no innings pitched in the big leagues and just 12 innings pitched at triple-A, leads the Jays in injury updates and promise. Which may be all that this season is about.

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SCENE AND HEARD

For the most part, I like the Blue Jays’ City Connect jerseys, except for the numbers on the back. You need X-ray vision to read them. They look like they were designed by Harold Ballard … The Raptors pick 19th in the NBA draft. If available, should they be considering Bronny James at that spot? And after that, could they convince daddy to come along as a free agent? … Aaron Judge is back being Aaron Judge again. He leads all of baseball in home runs and OPS and the Yankees have the best record in the American League … MacIntyre, Fox and Dahmen is either an accounting firm or the leaderboard Saturday afternoon at the Canadian Open … I used to run into Rob Ford regularly around the football field at St. Michael’s College on Sunday afternoons. He was there because he loved youth football and that’s where it was being played. He was a regular. So, I’m not about to scream about naming a football stadium in Etobicoke after the late mayor. Considering all that he put into the game, he deserves that … With big wins in tennis come big responsibilities. That’s a terrific victory for Felix Auger-Aliassime at the French Open, the last Canadian alive in singles, taking down American Ben Shelton in straight sets. For that, he earns a match with the boy wonder, Carlos Alcaraz, in the Round of 16 on Tuesday. Can we say: ‘Ouch’? … Clearly on the Team Canada Olympic watch list: Alexis Lafreniere of the Rangers, Wyatt Johnston of Dallas, and now an obvious selection, Evan Bouchard of the Oilers on defence … Not that anyone cares but the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul bout is on hold because of Tyson’s recent injury. Not that a 58-year-old is supposed to be fighting, exhibition bouts or anything else … I like Dallas over Boston in the NBA Finals which means, if you want to make a buck, bet Boston. With the Stars up 2-1 in the series against Edmonton and leading 2-0 early in Game 4, it looked like Dallas was heading to the Stanley Cup. The Stars may be looking back at Game 4, over and over, this summer trying to figure out what went wrong … In the words of Lou Lamoriello, almost every pending NHL free agent is asking for too much money and too much term. Problem is, most teams don’t have much cap space. The salary cap has gone up by $4 million and a lot of clubs, the Leafs included, have already spent or committed that money to extended contracts, which further clogs the marketplace … I’ve been fortunate enough to watch the Stanley Cup presented live many times and the scene never fails to deliver. But I was personally shocked by how emotional I got watching the Walter Cup being presented to Minnesota of the Professional Women’s Hockey League the other night. It was special and it was historic … Umpire Angel Hernandez made one perfect call in his baseball career. He called himself out. It was time … Is Draymond Green now playing in the WNBA under the name of Chennedy Carter? … In the latest power rankings on ESPN, the Blue Jays are listed as the 20th best team in baseball, or the 12th best team in the American League. Does Edward Rogers know this? … Pascal Siakam and OG Anunoby have similar decisions to make. Do they stay with their current teams, sign friendly deals by NBA standards, or do they head to free agency and chase every last dollar? Sometimes being in a good place and a good situation is better than padding an already inflated bank account.

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AND ANOTHER THING

We should all be alive to hear what the world thinks of us, especially if the world thinks of us the way it thought about Bill Walton. The tributes were that special. Few athletes have ever been mourned so beautifully and by so many. It’s too bad, isn’t it, that we don’t get to hear these things when we’re alive? … If AFL statistics count for NFL players, and now Negro League statistics will be counted alongside MLB stats, why not have WHA statistics count along with NHL stats? If those stats were connected, Gordie Howe, not Wayne Gretzky, would be the career goal scoring leader at 975, followed by Gretzky at 940 and Bobby Hull at 913. Then Alex Ovechkin, well back at 853 … Since Paul Coffey landed in Edmonton to coach the Oilers defence, Bouchard’s offensive numbers have taken off. In 83 games with Coffey on the bench, Bouchard has 98 points … How would you like to be Team Canada’s Olympic basketball coach Jordi Fernandez and you look over at the Team USA bench, and there’s Steve Kerr sitting beside his assistants Erik Spoelstra, Ty Lue and Gonzaga coach Mark Few. That’s a touch intimidating … Brian Keefe is the new coach of the Washington Wizards. Brian Keefe is also Sheldon Keefe’s father. The two are not related … If Andrew Wiggins isn’t absolutely certain he wants to play for Team Canada at the Paris Olympics, then, simple, pick someone else. The days of grovelling over Wiggins as the great Canadian hope are long gone …. What was the first jersey you ever owned? For me, it was a Dave Raimey Argos jersey, No. 14. After that a Bob Griese Miami Dolphins T-shirt jersey … Is something wrong with Joe Pavelski? Is he finished or just having the first horrible post-season run of his career? The normally great playoff Pavelski has been almost invisible for the Stars … Same with Adam Fox. Clearly, he’s playing hurt with the Rangers. He’s way better than this … Kris Knoblauch has coached 86 games with the Oilers in total, winning 57 of them. That’s a 107-win pace on a baseball season … Scott Burnside wrote 175 double byline stories for the Toronto Sun with the late Al Cairns as his partner. Almost all of them were about the murderer, Paul Bernardo. The last one came in February of 1997. Burnside then turned to hockey writing. He was a Hall of Fame quality news reporter who became a Hall of Fame quality hockey writer. And it became official on Friday. He will be honoured by the hockey Hall in November. Hall of Fame life. Hall of Fame areer … The Leafs paid Bertuzzi $5.5 million in salary this season, same number the Oilers are paying Zach Hyman. And this makes less numerical sense: Hyman has scored 67 goals when combining regular season and playoff numbers — only three fewer than Auston Matthews scored for the Leafs. Hyman’s deal runs for four more years … Happy birthday to Coffey (63), Gary Bettman (72), Larry Robinson (73), Lou Nanne (83), Russ Courtnall (59), Ron Mikolajczyk (74), Lex Luger (66), Lawrence McCutcheon (74), Roman Josi (34), Craig Stadler (71) and Jerry Mathers as The Beaver (76) … And hey, whatever became of Scott Downs?
ssimmons@postmedia.com
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