Phil Kessel’s Playoff Performance Does Not Prove “He Was Fine in Toronto”
By Ryan Ritchie
“Phil Kessel’s Playoff Performance is Proof He Was Fine in Toronto” – A Wildly Misunderstood, Inaccurate Statement
On Tuesday, James Mirtle of the Globe and Mail released an article titled “Phil Kessel’s playoff performance is proof he was fine in Toronto”.
A part of that sour group that wasn’t overly fond of the way Kessel’s tenure ended in the city, Mirtle and Kessel backers alike are taking the opportunity to use his playoff performance as an opportunity to find justification in their original arguments from a year ago.
James is a very well-respected, knowledgeable writer. Unfortunately, not all of us share the same opinion on the Phil Kessel tenure in Toronto.
The original title statement is almost as confusing as some of the arguments made. Why are we comparing apples to oranges?
Live Feed
Pucks and Pitchforks
Optics are different from Toronto to Pittsburgh. To simply make a comparison of the player based on the score-sheet is not the proper way to absorb hockey, and its even more dangerous to analyze the game based on numbers alone.
Wouldn’t the comparable be those in the analytics community who simply base arguments off a single chart? Hockey is more than goals and assists, and it’s those intangible differences that separate the winners and losers.
To get a better understanding of the major difference (maybe we can finally put this Phil Kessel-Toronto talk to rest), we need to go back to the very beginning.
It’s the late 2000s, the Toronto Maple Leafs had recently hired Brian Burke to be the savior of the franchise. His first major move to get the ship headed in the right direction; acquiring a young Phil Kessel from the Boston Bruins – a player that Burke believed the Leafs could build a franchise around.
People often forget there was a crowd of experts, analysts, and fans in Leafs nation who raised an eye-brow from day one. There were many fans who didn’t believe a team could be built around Phil the Thrill from the very beginning (this writer included).
Now that you’ve put yourself in those fans shoes, imagine what you’re feeling a couple of years down the road watching Boston select Tyler Seguin and Dougie Hamilton in consecutive drafts.
More from Editorials
- The problem with another expansion franchise in the NHL
- Should the NHL make referees give postgame interviews?
- Why Carolina Hurricanes fans should be excited for the 2023-24 season
- Should The Seattle Kraken Consider Trading Shane Wright?
- Why any NHL team would be lucky to add Phil Kessel to their roster
Brian Burke and Leafs management made Phil Kessel the focal piece of the franchise. For fans of other teams, Phil to Toronto was Sidney to Pittsburgh, or Jonathan Toews to Chicago, even Anze Kopitar to Los Angeles. There’s a raised level of expectations for players in that specific role.
Those focal pieces of a winning franchise do more than people realize.
It’s about the little details, or intangibles – both on and off the ice. Whether it’s being a face in the community, a leader in the dressing room, or that guy a coach who can turn it in the last two minutes of a close one-goal game to be a game breaker – these were all unreasonable expectations of Phil.
Leafs management made Phil Kessel a spotlight player. A ice-time leader for forwards, the first guy called as an extra attacker, “the guy” to find on the PP, it was a recipe for disaster asking him to do too much.
It was a miscalculation by Brian Burke, but this sniper always had the makings of a solid secondary star if you could hide him behind a cast of one or two bigger name players.
Who is Phil Kessel as a Player?
The Good
– A top 5/10 offensive zone threat
– Deadly shot/release
– Incredible speed/acceleration
– PP specialist/threat
– Underrated Playmaking Abilities
The Bad
– Last man back vast majority of time (his two-way play has admittedly improved over the past two months)
– Tends to hold the puck too long (especially on PP), many of those shots find shin-pads and never make their way to the net, or miss the net completely.
– Could be one of the NHL’s best two-way forwards with his speed, but tends to be lazy when the opposition has possession
– If he gets knocked off a puck, he has a tendency to circle away from the play instead of using his stops/starts to fight to retain possession.
– Soft along the boards, at times can be caught allowing opposition to win close puck races in order to avoid being hit.
Related Story: Trade Scenarios for 8 Different Teams at the Draft
It’s no offence to Phil Kessel because he’s a great player – but you can’t be the focal piece of a franchise with those types of bad habits. It was unfair to put Phil in that situation, as those types of secondary stars need to be a part of a solid core, not the foundation of that core.
Everyone seems to point the finger at the direction of the Leafs fan base and media. Calling the Phil Kessel debacle a media fabricated story that was blown out of proportion and a fire kept burning by fans and media alike.
This couldn’t be any further from the truth. The blame should be squarely placed on Leafs management – the people who ultimately made the decisions. All the fans and media do is report/analyze the product that is presented to them.
Related Story: NHL Weekly Roundup: Latest News and Rumors
Review of the Past Year
It’s somewhat amusing to watch NHL fans continue to take shots at the Maple Leafs franchise, as if the fan base hasn’t endured enough turmoil over the last nearly 50 years. The funniest part is watching a two to three-month sample size being used as evidence to discard the previous six seasons – even though varying factors exist over that past calendar year.
Live Feed
Union and Blue
Let’s call it like it is. For the first few months of the 2015-16 NHL season, a big question in Pittsburgh was, “why is Phil Kessel unable to find chemistry with Sidney Crosby or Evgeni Malkin?”.
To be honest, it was largely Marc-Andre Fleury and Sidney Crosby who carried this team for much of the season. The situation was even more dire back in October when Sidney Crosby couldn’t score a goal, but he eventually broke out of the slump towards the end of 2015, and as we know, put up a Hart Trophy worthy performance.
Where was Phil Kessel? In 2015 (Oct-Dec), no.81 had 11 goals, 10 assists (21 points) in 37 games. At the end of February, Kessel was up to 19 goals, 21 assists (40 points) after 61 games.
It wasn’t until Evgeni Malkin went down in mid-March that Phil Kessel caught fire. He was sitting at 20 goals, 25 assists (45 points) in 67 games at that point.
Over those final 15 games, Phil the Thrill had six goals, eight assists – essentially masking a very sub-par season.
You can give Mike Sullivan all the credit in the world for a lot of things, but the construction of that HBK line (Nick Bonino, Carl Hagelin, and Phil Kessel) was more of a natural design due to their injury situation. Leafs fans can at least find amusement in the fact that it took Tyler Bozak type players to generate the right chemistry for Pitt’s deadly sniper.
Let’s not forget that a few factors have changed since Kessel’s departure to Pittsburgh.
Phil never took the opportunity for elite offseason training with Gary Roberts to shed 10 pounds during his tenure in Toronto.
Mirtle even shares a statement from coach Mike Sullivan which reads, “I think Phil Kessel’s game has evolved into a complete two-way game”; is that not admission of it being non-existent or not very effective before?
By the sounds of things, we’re not even talking about the same player whatsoever.
James Mirtle via Globe and Mail,
“A lot of things went wrong for Kessel in Toronto, but two of the biggest issues were fixed in his new home. With the Penguins, he is not expected to face other team’s top line every shift while playing with middling linemates. And he isn’t in a system that struggles mightily to maintain time in the offensive zone”.
Misused as first line forward, asked to play against competition above his ability, and because of that, it’s fans/media’s fault for not recognizing the player he could be if Toronto had been better overall, and Phil were immersed in a lesser role.
Mirtle also accuses the Toronto Maple Leafs of “selling low” on Phil Kessel. Apparently fans/media influence forced Brendan Shanahan to choose a new direction.
Since when is shedding nearly $7 million dollars (north of $40 million total) selling low if you already have a plan to rebuild and can acquire a 1st rounder and top prospect (Kasperi Kapanen)?
For the direction new Leafs management was headed, was there ever such a thing as selling too low in this situation? The goal is to build through the system; a pair of prospects and an extra $7 million/year to spend through 2022 was motivation enough.
Related Story: Aly's Pre-Draft Edition: First Round Mock
James Mirtle via Globe and Mail,
“The Leafs style of play – and lack of personnel – always worked against Kessel. That’s why he may have thrived under new Leafs coach Mike Babcock. He could have shifted into this type of role and “evolved” in Toronto, at least until he was dealt. One wonders what a productive Kessel – with 33 points in his past 31 games – might have fetched at the trade deadline?”
Live Feed
Broad Street Buzz
Funny how James Mirtle still believes keeping close to $7 million dollars/year for the next six years would have been a good idea. Isn’t he basically suggesting Toronto should continue that nasty cycle of sitting just outside the playoffs with the occasion berth?
Instead of drafting Auston Matthews in a couple of weeks, having him join the roster in the Fall, Mirtle prefers Kessel, and maybe Toronto would have chosen Logan Brown or Michael McLeod – two of three-year projects.
Bottoming out, snagging a top three to five pick was always the only the logical decision in the Kessel debacle.
On a side note, Mirtle’s proposition was to allow other players to emerge around and push Kessel into the shadows.
One problem, how do you explain to Mitch Marner and William Nylander 3-4 years down the road as to why a secondary player earns more money than them? Good friction for the dressing room.
Final Thoughts
While there’s a lot of negative energy being thrown Phil Kessel’s way throughout this rant, I want to make it clear this is not an attack on Phil Kessel or the type of player he is.
To be honest, even those of us who look at Phil’s tenure in Toronto unfavorably (and may even have unjustified dislike for him based on the situation), we still feel sorry for Phil being forced to fill those type of shoes.
More from Puck Prose
- Detroit Red Wings 2023 Rookie Camp Has Plenty of Ups and Downs
- This Columbus Blue Jackets rookie doesn’t want to be forgotten
- 2 trades the Boston Bruins must make to secure the Stanley Cup
- 3 reasons the Avalanche won’t win the Stanley Cup in 2024
- This is a big year for Alex Turcotte and the Los Angeles Kings
Pittsburgh was always a perfect fit for no.81. With guys like Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Marc-Andre Fleury (now Matt Murray) to steal the spotlight, Phil was immersed in an environment where he could thrive in the background, and quietly go about his business – which is mostly scoring goals.
Hats off to the Pittsburgh Penguins and Phil Kessel for their late performance in 2016. The NHL’s hottest team down the final stretch of the regular season managed to continue their dominance through the playoffs, and are now one game away from hoisting the Stanley Cup yet again.
For guys like Sid and Geno, they’ve been here before, but for others like Phil Kessel, it’s almost an epic redemption-type sports moment. A Cup victory could help make-up for those many prime years lost in a bad situation.
Even better, Phil the Thrill is making a strong argument to be named Conn Smythe Winner. You don’t need to be a Phil Kessel fan to appreciate an incredible hockey story like this.
Next: NHL Mock Draft 6.0: 7 Rounds of Prospect Analysis
Can we at least take a moment to savor the present, show appreciation for what the Penguins have done over the past few months? To sit there and take shots at a fan base/media outlets because you’ve found what you believe to be justification in an argument that made little sense a year ago (and unfortunately still makes zero sense today) is a low blow.
2017 will mark the 50-year anniversary of the last time Toronto won a Stanley Cup, why take a shot at the one NHL franchise that has been through more agony than any other over the last half-century?