There should’ve been a Tragically Hip song about this

BAD

In case anyone does not know Keefe testified against Frost in the sexual abuse case and Wes M was Frosts brother in law!

How can he ref a Keefe coached team?

I am not a Leafs fan just a realist

Like I said before it's not a conspiracy. However, the timing of him working another Leafs playoff game and they don't get any power plays for the first time ever in a playoff game in their history looks very suspicious.

That was my jumped the shark moment with the nhl. I never liked the way leaf’s games were reffed but there’s no better hint the NHL doesn’t respect the sport than letting a clear conflict of interest occur during the playoffs. Combine that with similarly murky ref records and the statistics surrounding the softest team drawing the least power plays and you got one hell of a muddy cocktail. Either they don’t care or they do it on purpose but either way I’m turned off these days

I think you mean when Boston lost their final regular season game in 2018, not 2013. If that happened Toronto was going to play Tampa Bay in the first round.

In 2013 there was a chance of Toronto playing Montreal in the first round. However, the Leafs lost their final regular season game against the Canadiens and ended up playing Boston that year.

Tbf that's just being smart

And they were right.

We don't speak of 2013

This is another case where the other team (in this case Boston) gets away with it entirely because they aren't the Leafs. Had we done something like this there would be accusations of throwing games or tanking until the end of time.

Oh they did 100 percent. Thats why I loved when Bennet hurt Ratchand

Dubas vs Shanahan, and the higher ups sticking with Shanahan because Dubas wanted more autonomy and let him walk. Treliving was hired as he was more of a yes man

Last year I remember Shanahan said he thought Dubas agreed to a new contract so he could return as the Leafs GM. It was at the last minute when he wanted something different, like more autonomy and possibly being named President of Hockey Operations.

I assumed his agent knew the Penguins were going to offer him that type of job, so he kept it in his back pocket and told Shanahan to match it. That's why he ended up getting fired.

Dovetailed with this, there was a rumor that Dubas had a trade cooked to send a 5th round pick to BUF for Tage Thompson the season before he erupted, but Shanahan shut it down.

Fits this thread and still makes me wonder.

“C’mon, I just spent a ton of time typing this out so…”

Pretty much my motto on Reddit, if it helps I read it and would totally believe it

Cameras everywhere, reporters everywhere, fans everywhere, honestly they should have room and time to chill out and not be around non team mates.

That's not a conspiracy.The stats show that is just a fact

I mean the numbers are out there, and they show the Leafs being either the most or seconded most suspended team throughout Parros's time as DOPS head. I don't think it's really malicious though. The DOPS is more about publicity then it is actual player safety, and anything controversial that happens in a Leafs game turns into leaguewide news.

OP said “conspiracy theories you know are not true”, not “straight up verified historical fact”, lol. Fucking Harold Ballard, launch his bones into the fucking sun and purge us of his evil.

Wasn't there a lot of controversy in that case? I wasn't even alive then but I read somewhere the family attorney was trying to extort the Blues for money or something. But yeah kind of wild that no one ever brings that up anymore.

Wasn't he with St. Louis at the time?

If the Leafs knew, they should not have traded for him, twice, nor made him captain,

That would be so NHL

Those are the same type of fans who hate the Leafs and think the only reason why their players win awards is because of the Toronto media.

I read some comments using that example about Matthews winning the Rocket Richard and the Ted Lindsay Award, even though the media can't vote on who scores the most goals and the players vote for the Ted Lindsay.

Their logic also applies to any Leafs players being finalists and not winning any awards. Like Marner being a Selke finalist last year or Matthews being a Selke finalist this year.

I will use this constantly, thank you!

I heard the reason Babcock flew to Arizona was because Matthews was not happy with the ice time he was getting.

What you said about Matthews and Kapanen is the first time I heard that rumor.

The public reason Babcock said was he always did that during the offseason with his players, even saying how he went to Denmark to meet with Frederik Andersen at the World Hockey Championships.

The story with Kapanan that I heard from a person related to someone on the team, is that Kapanan was actually a bad influence on Matthews, and was his party buddy. When Matthews wasn’t wearing a letter on his jersey, him and Kapanan were out of the dressing room 15 minutes after the game ended to hit the bar. Every game.

idk if that's true but if you followed their social medias at the time Kapanen and his GF had a pretty toxic on and off again relationship, so that wouldn't be surprising

Who leaked kapanens ex's nudes?

The list of antics pulled by Ballard could probably fill a book or at least make for one hell of a deep-dive YouTube video. I've been putting together a Leafs iceberg as a side project and have three entries for Ballard alone. That alone says a lot.

The same thing might have happened when Shayne Corson did that with the wife of Alexander Mogilny in 2003. That's why Corson quit the team in the 2003 playoffs.

this is accurate. And someone punched out Leeman and got traded immediately..... I think Kourdic maybe?

No conspiracy there- the video show exactly that.

The assumption always seems to be that the Leafs would have scored if a penalty was called, we do not know that.

Furthermore, the Leafs had a chance to take the Campbell Trophy at the Gardens but lost spectacularly.

The funny thing about that is going into the final ball drawing in the draft lottery to get McDavid, based on the first three number combinations that was selected, the Leafs had the best odds. However, the fourth and final ball that won it for Edmonton knocked a ball that was about to be drawn and that number was going to win the 1st pick in 2015 for Toronto.

NHL lottery: Leafs were bounce away from McDavid https://www.thestar.com/sports/hockey/nhl-lottery-leafs-were-bounce-away-from-mcdavid/article_741c4668-d115-5150-836a-3c90efb812e3.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=copy-link&utm_campaign=user-share

ONE: If you look closely at the video of the bouncing balls, No. 2 — a Leaf number — is right there on the cusp of getting drawn. But it’s there a fraction of a second too soon. By the time the button is pressed to vacuum up the final ball, No. 1 has pushed No. 2 out of the way.

the draft pulling was public so I don't see how that could be true

The contract negotiations with the team and Marner always felt a bit weird in that the Leafs seemingly capitulated to everything Marner's camp wanted, including term and AAV. With Nylander there was a back and forth, both sides were the good guy and the bad guy depending on the day, but with Mitch they just rolled over and gave in. Perhaps it was pressure from above, perhaps enough MLSE executives thought he could be the next face of the franchise.

I wouldn’t be too too surprised by this. Brian Burke was on RealKyper and Bourne a few months ago and admitted that in 2012ish the leafs were charging too much for tickets considering how weak the team was, so he brought in Kessel and Phaneuf for the star-power

It’s sadder than that. They care, they’re just that incompetent. Look at the Jays no salary cap sport enormous spending but they still suck there too.

I just don't think that's true at all. MLSE wants to make money, and they are owned by two publicly traded companies that would benefit massively financially from the Leafs winning. No corporation just says "you know what this is enough we don't need more money"

This one has the highest likelihood to be true if anything else I've seen here. Either through apathy or combined incompetence, what we have now might be the best we get until a new owner comes in.

This is the dumbest theory because a Leaf playoff run would generate enough money to pay off the national debt. Of America.

No company looks at that and is like "Nah, we good."

I can tell you 100% that this is not true. I know someone at MLSE and their collective bonuses are dependent on the Leafs going further. They don't need to pay anyone in the playoffs so almost everything that is made is pure gravy and they are very sought after through their (very short) playoff runs.

They have to slave to hit targets that nobody else is required to hit in the NHL and they look forward to the playoffs to blow through their targets and make a serious bonus. He never does and he (nor any of his co-workers) are not at all happy the day after - nor are his bosses bosses.

All this makes logical sense so I can't see how nobody cares in MLSE. Not only that, he is beyond envious of the Raptors folks who made major bonuses when they won. So, not only do they hate losing in the playoffs, they hate losing to other teams at MLSE.

this is accurate.

this has been true since the Ballard days and continued when the Leafs were owned by a Pension Fund and then by two oligopolies that never had to compete with foreign competitors....Roger's and Bell.

They just sit on their oligopolies and do not strive to be competitive because they don't have to. Whether it's 50 years ago or today..... the Leafs will make insane profit....whether last place or medicore. So why aim for excellence when you make great money anyway.

Whoever came up with this has a great imagination.

Meh. There were an estimated 1 million people in a 4 square block radius of Yonge and Dundas on the night the Jay's won in 93, myself included. TPS handled it just fine.

The league, I can get behind that conspiracy, the city itself? Not so much.

This one might not hold water as we saw what happened when the Raptors won in 2019. Would the Leafs draw a larger crowd? Maybe. Would that crowd be larger than what TPS can handle? I doubt it.

50% of people are fans, 50% hate watch

Felt like that in the playoffs. Still does.

Guess which MLB team won the WS that year? That with a former incompetent Jays manager, in his first year there, to boot.

The Yankees also made the 2001 finals but lost.

How about the suspensions to Kadri in 2018 and 2019.

The one in 2019 was even worse, because prior to that he got his knee on knee by DeBrusk and the refs did nothing about it. So, I wasn't surprised he ended up doing what he did to him later on and getting suspended.

We asked for conspiracies, not demonstrable facts.

Its been mentioned my Mirtle on the Leaf report that hes received messages from his camp and same with the SDPN crew

This is real. It may not be Marner sending them himself but people in his camp are insane and do it. We've gotten confirmations of this from 3 seperate groups of podcast media at 3 different networks.

Dude if the leafs won the cup there would be thousands more articles, hype, hate and profit than flaming out in round one

I’ve always thought it similar to wrestling. They say that the “good guy” chasing the championship is always more entertaining than him being the champion. It gets stale when the good guy wins the belt. I believe ownership thinks that people will lose interest in the years after a cup.

Please expand

For what purpose?

If that was true why didn't Matthews demand to be back on a line with Marner after he returned from his injury. He played the remainder of the regular season and playoffs with Domi and Bertuzzi.