The best hockey coach extant wasn’t Maple Leafs-proof.And the “pain” Mike Babcock warned about his first day on the job has been extracted from his own flesh.Nobody could have anticipated Babcock would last just four-plus seasons and three straight playoff appearances, if never beyond the first round. So he had that albatross.But this is what inevitably happens to Toronto coaches: a half-dozen of them canned in this millennium, Babcock joining Pat Quinn, Paul Maurice, Ron Wilson, Randy Carlyle and (interim) Peter Horachek as The Discarded.Because, as everybody knows, you can’t fire the players. Whether this move fires up the players, under incoming Sheldon Keefe, remains to be seen. Historically under such circumstances, only a modest bump in fortunes has resulted. It’s rarely real — the St. Louis Blues last season a gobsmacking anomaly.The crucial question, post-Babcock: How real is this mess of a Leafs team, mired in a six-game losing skid. Few believe that’s who the Leafs are, with their embarrassment of marquee player riches and a top-drawer netminder. The inexplicable part is how they sank to such sad-sack depths, outside a wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference, in what feels like the blink of any eye.For all their talents, the Leafs have played laggard, raggedy hockey since the campaign began. Yes, there were significant injuries. They never got healthy, even as the long-term rehabs returned to the lineup. But the frail defence was a continuing consternation as the blue line steadfastly regressed, Tyson Barrie — a Kyle Dubas get — the most boldface bust. Again, that goes under the Dubas debit ledger.No pushback across the lineup, no extra effort, no emotional engagement, no giving their own heads a good shake. Too many players just doing their own lah-di-dah thing, outside the structure the coaching staff attempted to impose. And maybe that structure was a poor fit for this collection of players. Bab ...
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