So, Mats Sundin doesn't want to play for any other team, save for the Toronto Maple Leafs. Last weekend's news? Nope. It's the lead story on sports broadcasts again, today.
Sundin said he'll play for Toronto next year or nobody. This is news? Well, to those who thought his rationale that he wanted to be with a team all year long in the quest for the Stanley Cup, rather than becoming a 'rental,' meant he'd consider going somewhere else this coming fall. But those people ignored the other words he said when he announced his decision NOT to waive his no-trade catalog.
He spoke of his relationship with the players and citizens here in the greater T.O. area. He didn't say the word love, but one gets the idea that Sundin isn't exactly a big-time orator. A big-time hockey player, but not a big-time talker. He felt leaving would be abandoning his ship before it completely went down, and that there was no such thing as a safe harbour, Stanley Cup chances be damned.
In other words, Sundin did everything a captain should. He led by personal example by being the best player on the team (and not being the best paid). He showed strength of character and interest in team goals over personal gain. And he got pilloried for it by the all-knowing (about nothing) Toronto fans.
I posted right here that he should have accepted a trade and gone somewhere else to win the Stanley Cup most hockey players want. And I told him not to come back, for his own good and for the needs of this team to hit rock-bottom, something that wouldn't happen to the team that could play Sundin 20 minutes a game. He is too good. But there's something noble about a player that says, with all honesty, that he wants to retire a Maple Leaf.
Now, the same maroons who decried his lack of a Wendell Clark type game over the years, call him selfish. No way the team should let him come back next season. If he does, he has to come on the Leaf terms, which would not include a no-trade clause. And he should take a big pay cut so the club can go out and offer the moon for the likes of Jason Blake (successfully) and Bobby Holik (unsuccessfully). Any wonder why the Leafs are two generations from being a good NHL franchise?
If I get hired as the new Toronto GM (okay, NOT a probability), I give Mats Sundin a blank cheque on a contract with a no-trade provision. IF he signs it, I then buy out the deadwood and start over. Building around a captain to be proud of, who can still play at a good level in today's NHL, that's possible. I also bet that the blank cheque comes back with a ridiculously low number on it. Given HIS choice, I bet Sundin would play for three million dollars, about half of what he's worth. But he'd want to free up finances to get him to his dream, hoisting the Stanley Cup in a Maple Leaf sweater. Hey, people play the lottery with less chance every day.
On the other hand, if Sundin doesn't want to put up with the rubes along the rails any longer and decides to self-grant his wish to retire a Maple Leaf, then I would wish him well in his post-hockey career, assuring him that there would always be a place in Toronto at Air Canada Centre for a great, great captain.
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