Jordan Schmaltz floats Utah as “sneaky dark horse” for Auston Matthews: Leafs Morning Take
After falling just short of a World Series last fall, Opening Day is here for the Toronto Blue Jays.
Optimism is in the air and people are excited for their return. For the past decade, it’s felt that way for the Maple Leafs every season opener, but not this year. That’s for sure.
We kicked things off on the Friday edition of Leafs Morning Take by giving our quick thoughts on the Blue Jays as they get set to kick off their season against the A’s. Most importantly, it’s a topic that has been sweeping social media the past few days: How do we feel about the Jays raising a banner for winning the AL pennant? Tune in to find out.
Back to the Maple Leafs. They have nine games left in their train-wreck season, highlighted by this four game road trip that will get underway on Saturday night in St. Louis. Toronto’s 3-2-2 since Auston Matthews went down. To that point, they’ve taken 38 penalties (and 89 penalty minutes) over that seven game stretch, which obviously has caught our attention.
Additionally, we talked quite a bit of the direction of the franchise. According to the top insiders, change is coming. What does that mean, though? It’s very quiet in Toronto, which means, stuff’s likely happening behind the scenes. Keith Pelley is reportedly working with some urgency, so we’ll see what that ultimately means in a few short weeks from now.
Meantime, former NHLer and Home By 3 co-host Jordan Schmaltz dropped by to hit on the current state of the Maple Leafs. After sharing what it was like cranking the siren for the Vegas Golden Knights, Schmaltz dove into Mitch Marner’s play and his evolving dynamic with Auston Matthews—even debating who misses who more. He also stirred the pot on Matthews’ future, floating Utah as a “sneaky dark horse” destination if things ever shift in Toronto. Schmaltz didn’t stop there, weighing in on the futures of Brad Treliving and Craig Berube while name-dropping Doug Armstrong as a potential replacement option. He wrapped by touching on William Nylander’s up-and-down season and what he expects from the Leafs in their first matchup against Radko Gudas following the Matthews knee-on-knee incident.
At any rate, that’s going to do it for another week of Leafs Morning Take. Big one coming up on Monday. We’ll recap Leafs/Blues, plus preview Toronto’s visit to Anaheim a.k.a the Radko Gudas REVENGE game. Chris Pronger will be by to dish on that and much, much more.