Babcock gives every Maple Leaf clean slate
New coach says rancid past has no bearing this season, everyone gets fresh start
In preparing for his new job, coaching the 2015-16 Maple Leafs, you may think Mike Babcock might have wanted to look at video of last year to get a taste of who can do what, who can’t and what he’s getting himself into. But no. “I haven’t done that,” said Babcock. “And the reason I haven’t done that is because things went so poorly, why would I watch them be bad? It makes no sense to me.”
Then came the real message of this training camp to the Maple Leafs returning players.
“They’ve got a clean slate,” said the new coach.
It was a phrase uttered Thursday on the opening day of camp time and again. The term “clean slate” was thrown around so much that had the conversations been tweeted, it would have trended.
“I think the best word is there are no preconceived notions,” said the team’s new general manager Lou Lamoriello. “And I think that anybody who does hold preconceived notions when they don’t know or haven’t seen them enough is making a mistake.”
Nothing was more refreshing to the ears of the likes of Nazem Kadri, who’s trying to fulfil the promise of being a first-round pick; Joffrey Lupul, who’s trying to have a healthy season for a change, and Dion Phaneuf, the beleaguered captain who plays perhaps more minutes than he should.
They’d like to forget last season, too, when the team went from a playoff spot to fourth-worst overall with a spectacular free-fall through the standings.
“(The clean slate) makes you feel good,” said Lupul. “Last year was not our best moment, so for him to say that . . . last year is last year. That’s good news for everyone.”
Babcock has had multiple conversations with players over the summer telling them just that.
“It’s important knowing that he believes in you and believes in the team,” said Kadri. “That’s definitely motivating for everybody. It is a clean slate.”
It’s remarkable how the conversation around the Leafs has suddenly changed. A year ago, the fan-base didn’t believe in the message from GM Dave Nonis and coach Randy Carlyle.
The new regime has the fans believing again.
The fans a year ago seemed to not like the players. One whipping boy, Phil Kessel, is gone. Another, Phaneuf, remains.
But Babcock — perhaps spending a bit of his credibility — expressed a great deal of faith in Phaneuf, and in doing so may have turned the temperature down around the captain, perhaps convincing his critics to have another look.
“It’s an easy target if you’re the captain,” said Babcock. “We’re going to look after him with structure and talking to him. I think he’s going to have a real good year.
“I like Dion as the captain of the Leafs. He’s going to be the captain of the Leafs. He’s our leader right now and we can really help him with the leadership side of things and we’ll help him be the best he can be just like everyone else.”
Phaneuf was thankful for Babcock’s unequivocal support.
“That means a lot to us as players,” said Phaneuf. “We want to have that support, but we also want to earn it. So it’s not that it’s just going to be handed to us. He said he’s going to support us and he said that publicly, but it’s our job to put the work in to repay him for that.”
In truth, Babcock hasn’t said anything previous new coaches haven’t said: about playing a particular structure (“template,” was Carlyle’s word) or returning the historic Original Six team to its “rightful” spot among the elite teams in the NHL.
But there’s no doubt one of Babcock’s traits will be to accentuate the positive. And he’s going to be their support system when times are bad and their confidence in is lacking “and they feel like they’re by themselves, and they feel like no one has their back. And they feel like they can’t go anywhere and do anything. And they’re not as proud as they should be,” he said. “Can you imagine coming to the rink every day and never feeling good about yourself? “I can’t even imagine.” That, in a nutshell, was the feeling around the Leafs last season.
“I want to catch them being good,” said Babcock.
“We’re going to catch them doing it right, we’re going to build a confidence and a way to play.”