Recently there has been a lot of animosity between the Toronto Maple Leafs management group, mainly GM Brian Burke, and the Toronto media.
You can throw Leafs coach Ron Wilson into that group as he has had to use some minor misdirection to get his young goalies some peace and quiet while trying to get them comfortable in the net.
The first incident was with Ben Scrivens being called up and Wilson not letting the media know when he was going to start the goalie, who ultimately got his first start on the road in Columbus.
He then pulled a similar move when James Reimer came back from injury and was told he was going to play against the Bruins this past Saturday, a decision Wilson had made three days prior.
And of course all hockey fans in Toronto are familiar with the recent incident where Toronto Star columnist Dave Feschuk took it upon himself to call James Reimer’s mother when Reimer was out with his head injury.
It seems as this disconnect with the Toronto media all began at the beginning of this season, with the Leafs keeping a lot of news regarding the players quiet and not divulging injury news.
For a team that televises its practices and makes players available for interviews after practice, between games, during the intermissions and after the games, it seems as though this policy is actually a good idea.
Social-media-collage_original_original_crop_340x234
In previous years the coaches answered media questions and pretty much made it known to the league who was injured and what was going on with the team.
But this season that’s changed.
I think the Toronto media really started to feel that maybe their days were numbered when Wilson and Burke both took to Twitter in an attempt to correct all the “wrong information” that the Toronto media was putting out.
Ron Wilson (@coachrw63) and Brian Burke (@LeafsBB20) currently have a combined following of 79,988 people on Twitter.
Let’s say Wilson starting tweeting things like “Mike Brown not in tonight’s lineup because of back spasm” or “Grabo is not playing tonight because he flew back to Toronto to with his girlfriend for the birth of their second child.”
That eliminates some questions from the morning scrum and may eventually eliminate the post-practice coach interview altogether.
All it would take is for Burke to start tweeting about trade and player rumors—and I know at least once this season we will see a tweet similar to “stay tuned Leaf fans, as we have a player acquisition to announce.”
Wilson and Burke joining Twitter was basically the beginning of the end of people like Steve Simmons, Damien Cox and things like Howard Berger’s personal blog, etc.
I personally don’t really like the media people in Toronto, since most just write their opinions and not much of anything else.
Should Wilson and Burke tweet about the Leafs?
Yes No Submit Vote vote to see results
This past Tuesday, Steve Simmons wrote an article for the Toronto Sun entitled “Burke’s becoming an embarrassment.”
In that article he talks about incidents where he has questioned Brian Burke and how he has been cut off from e-mails, texts and most importantly has been blocked from receiving tweets from the accounts of Wilson and Burke.
Simmons talks about how he thinks Burke is trying to control the message in Toronto and what is being written about his team. This may be true as Burke, while the GM in Vancouver, did seem to get people fired.
So, is this a good path for the Leafs to go down? Should the Leafs make all news and notes exclusive to Leafs TV?
When it comes to sports I think beat reporters and the ones that travel with the team are going the way of the dodo bird.
Finally, all the noise in Toronto and the annual “plan the parade” line may disappear.
I only hear these lines from the Toronto media anyway. I haven’t heard someone say that line in person in years, because the first time they said it, they heard how stupid it sounds.
Unlike the Toronto media, who just like the sound of their own voices.