On The Take No. 11: Explaining the Exodus

Hey guys,

Yeppers, I'm back again with my monthly OTT...not to be confused with bi-weekly articles. No, OTT is a column I use to talk about more than one thing that's on my mind, so you know it should be a lengthy read.

This column, I'm feeling like discussing not just Toronto's loss of the Mecca of the hockey world title through players and personnel leaving...but also those who've found themselves on the unemployment line courtesy of WWE. The two-sport column is back.

First, I want to rant about the Hardcore Holly situation. I hated thinking this way, but now I see I was right. Holly was written out so weakly and disrespectfully after working for WWE for 15 years, I actually didn't feel totally bad about Vince being kicked in the head on Monday.

I feel concerned about Vince’s condition, but there’s a part of me that was happy to see that for all the superstars he mistreated-the latest of which being Bob Holly.

I understand the need to cut the fat in these horrible economic times, even though as a Canadian, I have it a bit better. I understand firing people who don’t get over with the fans.

I felt so bad for people like Sean Morley (Val Venis) and D-Lo Brown when they were canned because the Cena fans are the reason. They’re all young kids, most of whom never saw either in their prime. So, they finally were fired.

Bam Neely never had me, so I was less than surprised to see him go. But the recent firing of Bob Holly really got me hot. This man gave everything to WWE, even doing humiliating gimmicks (e.g. Sparky Plugg, Bombastic Bob in the Midnight Express redux) to keep moving along.

Since his debut in early 1993, he had won tag titles, been a jobber, got over slightly working as Hardcore Holly because, like a certain HOFer, he was allowed to be himself. After his injury in the early 2000s, his return to face Brock Lesnar even gave him his one and only chance at the WWE Title.

We all knew he wouldn’t win; the match was about revenge. But at least he got the match.

Holly became almost as respected backstage as the Undertaker and he conducted himself as a leader, albeit a very angry, mean one. He hated rookies and was expected to make them prove themselves through him, just as Taker was at points in his career.

So, he got into a thing with Cody Rhodes, a man who is second generation, being groomed to be bigger than his HOF daddy. The storyline started slow, I’ll grant you, but it really made Cody better, in the ring and on the mic.

Almost 16 years have passed since Holly was hired and presented as a race car driver who moonlighted as a wrestler. He may not have liked certain gimmicks, but he did them. He earned respect in the ring for his toughness and his prideful attitude. I know I’m not the only fan who thinks so.

To have a man like him, a solid wrestler who got a bad break in the charisma department, be written out by a double-cross that would’ve kept his character down realistically a couple of weeks...it was insulting.

If anyone deserved to be written out on-air as a man rather than a gullible loser, it was Bob Holly. But alas, 15 years of loyalty means little to Vince in these times. Remember Million Dollar Mania?? “It’s all about the Monayyyyy!!!”

He wasn’t lying. Vince is cutting costs wherever he can, unfortunately he forgot about those wrestlers who stuck by him and thus, Holly went unseen for months after doing his part to build up Cody Rhodes, as he was asked.

I wouldn’t put it past him to jump to TNA just to make a statement that would put Vince back in his place.

Rant over. Unfortunately for those in WWE, the Firing Spree has only just begun.

Let’s move on.

It’s been no secret the Stanley Cup has stayed away from Canada, and so has the guy who runs the show in the NHL. But one Canadian team has had bad luck for much too long, and that team is the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Changes have been implemented, sure, but the money issue again affects this team more than the play on the ice. Toronto’s attendance has been the main reason why the Leaf management continues to be happy with mediocrity and continue to let great players leave their organization.

It's not just as a business matter; but most leave in disgust at the team they once played for. Toronto has been known as the “center of the hockey universe,” with the press, the HHOF there, the fans…all sorts of reasons. But the reality is, players don’t all want to be a part of that anymore.

Toronto has won three individual awards (just THREE!) in the 40+ years since the first expansion in 1967. Montreal has 33 to their credit. What’s worse, not one of those three awards have been for the best player or even best defenseman.

If the trend continues, their current face of the franchise, defenseman Thomas Kaberle, could be gone by the time he has teammates who can allow him to show the skill to be recognized as a Norris winner.

I’m going to limit the discussion to a few select people. They are: players such as Curtis Joseph, Bryan McCabe and the most notable loss in the last 20 years (if you believe the papers), Mats Sundin.

Coaches and GMs have been canned too, including Pat Quinn and John Ferguson Jr. Even their most successful GM this era, Cliff Fletcher has been jerked around. Let’s get into it.

Curtis Joseph leads Toronto out of the 1998 cellar, into the Eastern Conference Finals not once, but twice. His players praise him night after night for his heroics, for once, the Leafs are making almost as much money in jersey sales as ticket sales.

Then, it happens. Joseph and the Leafs get humiliated by the Carolina Hurricanes, a team many said didn’t deserve to even be in the 2002 playoffs. Suddenly, they hit the Cup Finals, while Toronto, the so-called center of the hockey universe, is stunned, glory just barely stolen from them.

Soon after that and a few other personal defeats, Joseph decides he would rather go somewhere where he has a realistic chance at a Cup, instead of sticking with a team whose fans have never given up on him.

He gives up on the Maple Leafs, signing with Detroit in 2003. Toronto has never recovered from this loss, wasting Calder winner Andrew Raycroft, and now rotating Vesa Toskala with a rookie.

Bryan McCabe was another man who was part of the Leafs late '90s revival. He and Kaberle were the team on D that the Leafs had lacked, and Toronto hit 100 points for the first time ever while he was doing his thing at the back end.

Still, once the playoffs arrived, Toronto couldn’t keep the momentum going. Again, the losses to New Jersey and Carolina hit hard on Leaf Nation…and their sole superstars. McCabe was considered one, until his personal play turned him into a goat.

Don’t kid yourself, when he decided to move to retirement town, otherwise known as Florida, he did it partly to get away from Toronto, as opposed to moving somewhere where he could win a championship.

And so it goes, Toronto’s most unheralded position, the reason so many sportswriters say they can’t hang with the big boys like San Jose, Detroit and Pittsburgh: defense.

Now, here in 2009, the final nail hit Mats Sundin square in the head. He had had enough as Captain of a team that couldn’t shine when it counted, were a victim of poor business decisions such as the hiring of JF Jr.

The team who could never win the big one, but survived mostly on the strength of their diehards and commonplace sellouts, no matter how good or bad the team was on the ice.

True, he seemed to be less frustrated with the team than the others and more with his role on a franchise going through a youth movement. But in the end, even Sundin’s resolve had ebbed away. He’s still in Canada; in another time zone.

I’ve always felt the firings of Paul Maurice in Carolina and Jacques Martin in Ottawa were at best a quick fix and at worst a huge mistake, a result of a knee-jerk reaction. A brain fart, if you will.

With all three teams suffering, maybe some fans feel the same way. Some wonder if anything can be done to save hockey in Canada, most notably in Ottawa and Toronto.

All I have to say is this: Did anyone recognize that guy behind the bench for Team Canada in the WJC?

Yeah the white hair, the tie, the suit, the emotion-filled face. That guy.

Well, his name is Pat Quinn, and he once led a team to a 35-game winning streak, another to a handful of seasons where they exceeded expectations. He won a Gold Medal, you know. Did it in 2002 with pros too.

Hmmm. I wonder if he’s still got it.

'Til next time,

This is your Crowd Coach signing off.