Last week, the Toronto Maple
Leafs unveiled a new logo that will be the symbol of the franchise starting
from the 2016/17 season. Before we go any further, let me say that even though
I am not a fan of the team, I like the new logo and feel like the change is long
overdue.
Now, a co-worker of mine
mentioned that he heard on a London, Ontario radio morning show that the hosts were
making fun of the logo. They condescendingly mocked it as too old, something
that had significance 60 years ago and no longer relevant today. First let me say,
they should focus more on improving their morning show, because it’s rather
stale and boring. Second, I feel it’s good to look back to the past and use the
success from then to plant seeds for future success.
Okay, since that’s out of the
way, let’s look at the reasons why I like the new/old Leaf logo. First of all,
why was a change needed in the first place? The other five original six teams
basically have the same logo they used during the Original Six Era. New York
still has “RANGERS” descending from left to right across the jersey. Montreal
still has the “C” and “H”. Detroit still has the winged wheel, Boston has the “B”
and Chicago has their native warrior. I know the Leafs still use a maple leaf
but the logo introduced prior to the 1970/71 season—and has been used for the
last 46 years—looked more like a cut-out from arts and crafts class more than
something taken from a maple tree.
Let’s look at some other teams
that are still using their original logo. The Buffalo Sabres, after a decade of
that horrible, heavy breathing bison head, are using the one they had when they
entered the league back in the seventies. The Islanders (we’ll forget the
couple of years they had Captain Hi-lander), Flyers, Oilers, and Blues also use
their original logo. Sometimes teams get caught up in a marketing blitz and
introduce new logos and jerseys (Anaheim, Ottawa) just for the sake of selling
merchandise. It’s nice to see teams that don’t fall into this pattern.
But the real reason I’m glad to
see the current logo go is simple. It represents everything that has been wrong
with the Toronto Maple Leaf franchise over the past 46 years. When I see that
logo, I see Harold Ballard, a cheapskate owner not willing to spend money on making
his team better and a Cold War, prejudiced old fossil, hell-bent on keeping any
Russian hockey player out of Maple Leaf Gardens. As TSN’s Dave Hodge once said
when he was with CBC, (and I’m paraphrasing) Ballard should spend less time
worrying about letting the Russians play in the Gardens and more time worrying
about the NHL teams he does let in who embarrass the Leafs on a regular basis.
The logo also represents a host
of other mind-boggling episodes that have happened over the last half-century.
The logo is General Manager Punch Imlach, feuding with Darryl Sittler, and
unable to trade him, instead trades his best friend on the team, Lanny
McDonald, just to spite Sittler. It’s trading Russ Courtnall to Montreal for
John Kordic. It’s the decision to make your team a bunch of goons in the late
80s by signing Dave Semenko and Al Secord.
It’s stripping Rick Vaive of the
captaincy after being a few minutes late for a meeting (Ballard again). It’s firing
Pat Burns after the head coach breathed some life back into the team in the
mid-nineties and flirted with a berth in the Stanley Cup Final. It’s firing Pat
Quinn a decade later after the coach/general manager led another mini-revival.
It’s signing or trading for
over-the-hill players like Eric Lindros, Ron Francis, Brian Leetch and Phil
Housley. It’s hiring a guy like John Ferguson Jr. as a General Manager when he
has no experience in the role. It’s firing a guy like Bryan Burke, someone who
knows what he’s doing, when he was guiding the team towards the light at the end of tunnel.
It’s the fact that the team was owned by the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Fund and
no one on the board cared about success for the team, as long as the dollars
kept rolling in.
It’s having arguably the best
player the franchise has had in the last half-century, Mats Sundin, and not
surrounding him with talented players to make him an even better player than he
was.
I could keep going but I’ll conclude
by saying that Leaf fans everywhere should be rejoicing at the arrival of the
team’s new logo. And take that symbol of 46 years of ineptitude—and made
what was once a great franchise into the league’s laughing stock—and burn it.
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