Barn Burner: Boomer & Pinder with Rhett Warrener - Keith Pelley’s Press Conference Was A DISASTER … What Now?? 😬 w/TSN's Darren Dreger | BB Clips

Episode Date: April 2, 2026

Boomer, Pinder and Rhett are joined by TSN’s Darren Dreger to break down Keith Pelley’s press conference, where the Maple Leafs president had a chance to bring clarity to a critical offseason but instead left fans and media with more confusion than answers. The guys dive into what went wrong, the lack of direction from leadership, and what it could mean for the future of the franchise.Youtube Link: https://youtu.be/fL3JQrD4aU8#nhl #nhlshorts #nhlplayoffs #nhlpredictions #nhlhockey #nhlpicks #stanleycup #stanleycupfinal #leafsnation #torontomapleleafs CHECK OUT OUR STUFF ⬇️BARN BURNER MERCHhttps://nationgear.ca/collections/shirts/FlamesnationBARN BURNER SHORTS https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLj_bcGtvvo-cW2DHEDZ6dEO5ePDmlhZc9&si=jo8iNGxT4ImhS2Y8📲 Follow us:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fnbarnburner/X (Twitter): https://x.com/barnburnerfn?lang=en🎧 Listen on:Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/be/podcast/barn-burner-boomer-pinder-with-rhett-warrener/id1648562889Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3Mc6Qd5U22R2zbMlQ7RxIiProducer: Jack Haverstock Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Maybe all of this hubbub with Keith Pelly and the Leafs and all that maybe would have died down. Right now, it's still fresh. The press conference with Keith Pelly, fart in church. Would that be the analogy that some would use? Ah, yeah, some might. I'm not sure what I expected going into it. I don't know Keith Pelley well. I know him.

I mean, you know, I've been around the network television world for pushing 30 years. So we've crossed paths on many occasions. You know, and, you know, he's a very confident dude. He's got the corporate lingo nailed right down, right? So we got a full dose of that yesterday. But when you approach something like that, and you're alone, like, it's not like he had somebody flanked on either side, you know, a member of ownership.

I mean, he represents ownership. You know, he doesn't have a hockey operations department per se. You know, his head coach, Craig Barube, is on the road, so he doesn't have access to him. So there's Keith on an island. And I thought he was trying to be politically correct, whereas correct as he could be, he just doesn't have any answers.

And so it's easy for all of us to then dissect after the fact. And, you know, I was reading through some of my notes as I watched the media veil yesterday. And the one that really got to me. And I mean, you guys know Brad Treloving from a previous life for the Calgary Flames. But, you know, just a refresher course. So Brendan Shanahan, as president of hockey operations, hired Brad Trilvin to come in as general manager.

Then they hired Craig Barubik. So all three of those hockey minds aligned, right? And I would admit or submit that when they hired, when Barubei was hired and before that, Trillivin was hired. I mean, I feel like they felt like culture was not going to be a problem. Accountability, nope, that's not going to be a problem.

Structure. We've got all that covered off. And there will be automatic alignment. Yet Keith Pelley, his opening statement yesterday said, without structure, culture, et cetera, you can't be successful. And that's why change is happening today. Okay.

Well, I mean, you fired Shanahan and look there should be no tears shed over that or over Brad Trillivitt, right? I mean, Shanahan had an ample time to execute the Shannon plan and it just didn't work. I mean, they lost a pivotal game, didn't get to the conference final. Florida goes on and Florida wins the Stanley Cup. You know, Brad Trilving, he's not hiding. He's not looking for excuses or any of that. Toronto's had a horrible year.

But to say all of that and say, well, that's the reason. reason why we're here today is because we need a better alignment of culture and structure and all of that. I'm not buying it. You're a representative of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment. And the reason you're sitting in that chair is because wins equate to tens of millions of dollars in ownership or revenue. That's what matters. So among those, yeah, there's lots of different ways. The other thing that, the other takeaway for me that was strange was Pelley's perusal of the Atlantic Division and identifying Montreal and Buffalo and saying like they were a train that came out of nowhere.

Pardon? Like, I mean, Montreal has been in this rebuild for a stretch now. They've done it patiently and methodically. And now they're, they're reaping the rewards that coming out of it. You know, Buffalo has been in the mud for how many years until this year? And what made it more transparent, because I'll tell you this, guys, I know that Toronto was in trade discussions with the Buffalo Sabres and with the Montreal Canadiens. Now, I don't know that Matthew Nyes was ever really likely going to be traded at the trade deadline.

But the two names that Keith Pally mentioned, most definitely would have been names that Brad Trill Living would have asked for in those trade conversations. Michael Hage and Radimmerka. And I can tell you that when that came out, just the way it was just disclosed that way, a couple of teams went, nah, that's no good. You know, you just stay in your lane here. So yeah, it feels like tampering to be mentioning other teams players that that's and that's the Sabres top prospect big D man that they love. Yeah, it was. And Hage is terrific too. And look, it's. It's not that, you know, Merco was involved in the St. Louis Blues negotiations with Robbie Thomas and maybe on Colton Perrake, I don't know. But, you know, for the president, not of hockey operations of make-believe sports and entertainment to start lobbying out prospect names and, you know, saying that you got hit by a train, which was Buffalo and Montreal, which kind of knocked you out of your spot in the division.

That's not reality. That's not what happened. To me, it screams of the organization's need for a president again because we saw for so many years, not that Shanahan did a great job that didn't have blemishes because, you know, there were a lot of blemishes. But when you have a Toronto downtown corporate guy whose sports experience is running the European golf tour and, you know, sports networks, TV, when the GM is in charge and he's the only guy above him. It reminds me of when Brian Burke was here on how important that buffer was,

or Ken King and that buffer between GM and ownership. They need to hire president. Like, you can't hire a GM? Like, how is Keith Pelley going to evaluate GMs and hire? Like, what does he know about good GM? I mean, I'm sure a little, but clearly not as much as someone that's worked in hockey for the last 50 years. I'm with you. And he did acknowledge that they're going through the process of hiring a search firm, right? And he kept talking about the head of hockey operations, but didn't say, is that the president or is that the general manager? I just know from watching with Brad Trow Living has had to deal with in this Toronto market this year, I'm as convinced as ever, it's a two-man job. It is because there are

just too many outside opinions. And it's easy to say, okay, well, as a general manager, you've got to block all that stuff out. Well, yeah, I guess, but it depends where it's coming from. You know, if it's coming from ownership with a hockey idea, or if it's coming from a friend of an owner with a hockey idea, you know, out of respect, you're probably going to want to, you know, at least respond to an email or listen to a conversation or any of that. Well, guess what?

That's what the president does. A lot of that is what the president does. He is that buffer between ownership and hockey operations management. And, you know, with an organization as large as the Toronto Maple Leafs, I just don't see any. way around it. If you've got a really solid hockey voice who has some business savvy as your president, then maybe, maybe you can go a different way with the general manager,

either less experience or, and this was another curious comment that Pellie made talking about how everything, decisions being made moving forward, are going to be data generated and evidence based. You know, he's got the biggest analytics department in the sport. Dubus? No, the Toronto Maple Leafs. Oh, yeah, okay. Yeah, they do.

But Kyle would have been a big part of establishing that in Toronto, you know, before going to Pittsburgh. In terms of bodies, in terms of resources, in terms of how analytics are used, all of it, all of it. And so, again, I go back to the media avail and how it's easy to poke holes. But it felt like that in and of itself screamed of needing a president of hockey operation. If that person is sitting beside Keith Pelly and they're talking about why they fired Brad Trillivin yesterday, we're probably not even digging this deep into the conversation. Because you go, yeah, you know what, Triad has opportunity, took a couple of swings, he missed, he didn't do enough, he gets fired, happens all the time.

Yeah, that would have been, that was kind of my takeaway. Is there would have been fans who would have been, okay, good. Yeah, because truly, that didn't work. We fire them. Okay. Yeah. Who's next? Press conference.

K. Instill some confidence and some hope in me. Yeah. I would, yeah, you would come away feeling even worse, I would think. Oh,

on. Throw all the hullabaloo and bullshit comments out the window and go find a goaltender that can stop the puck. Their goaltending was hurt, injured, not good this year, whatever. Those are your guys.

Your whole world's different. It's not a, it's not a complicated business. No. So you can have all these answers and all this BS. I said it the other day. If, if Gregs, you could go be a GM of a hockey team. Guaranteed you could.

Are you going to be perfect? No. Isn't any out there that are? No. Go find a goaltender. Is Darcy Regrier, a great GM in Buffalo? No. Dominic Hasheck.

Yeah. Like, coaches, GMs ride the talent of the players they have. That's it. That's it. That's all. there's very rarely a move that's i would say mantha with pittsburg has been an awesome move that do you get a guy off the scrap heap he gets you 30 holy shit that's yeah pretty impressive that's a nice move there rarely happens if you have a goaltender you're you're a brilliant gm and a brilliant

coach yeah it's it's all this other stuff is just yeah and it's funny how it and to kind of tie it altogether. I think we were talking. I saw your clip on the show the other night about, you know, is Doug Armstrong possibly a guy? You've got Craig Barubi there. Both of those guys in a lot of ways, because Doug Armstrong, he was maybe on his last legs in St. Louis

and Craig Barrowby was an interim guy. Bennington goes off the charts hot. They win a Stanley Cup and both of those guys live for years. Yeah. Off of that one run because of a hot goaltender. It's just interesting. So yeah, I can imagine what the, but you're 100% accurate here.

If their goaltending is better, if the defensive group is better, I mean, Morgan Riley needs a change of address. He just needs a fresh start somewhere else. That's not going to be an easy contract to move, but I think it happens. You know, Brandon Carlo, maybe people didn't watch him close enough in Boston. He has not been a fit with the Maple Leafs. And then, you know, they've had injuries back then. Austin Matthews, you know, injury aside, he wasn't getting 50 again this year.

Like there are lots of, and I would submit this. Now, the fight aside, like the Max Stomian fight with Radco, Gugner's, okay, that was emotionally charged the other night, right off the park rob, boom, off they go. But if that team, if the Corona Maple Leafs played with that level of conviction and played for each other, the way that they played that game, even 50% of the time in the first half of the year

coming out of the Olympic break, it's probably a different story. They're probably in the plan. Yeah, it's called out to do it. It's not a natural. Yeah. Two weeks later, it doesn't change. Too late.

Too little too late. I had two quick ones on New Toronto. So one of the things Keith Pelly said was, this is not a rebuild. We've got pieces to build around. This is a retool. And you could build the case that a team starting with Austin Matthews and William Nealander,

and Matthew Nyes. Wow, what a great group. How you surround them is way trickier than pointing out that those guys are good at hockey, which they are. And then secondly, when we, you know, there was a recent ownership change at MLSC where Rogers has taken over rather than Tanabom own some and Bell own some and Rogers on some. Did this become a workplace for True Living where when there was shared ownership, it was very measured contact with the owner and now you've got something that's much more managing up than when he started?

because I recall at the beginning that, you know, what he dealt with in Calvary versus there was night and day, but it might have ended up being quite similar because he had to check in with ownership here a lot. Right. And I think that could be a part of it for sure. But the owners, they're the same as every owner in the national hockey. All they want to do is win, right?

There's just more volume of noise in Toronto. And, you know, their corporate friend group, again, educated people have opinions. Unfortunately, a lot of their opinions are hockey related, right? So those opinions then go down to hockey management. And management is like, all right, well, I can't do that. You know, I'd like to trade for Connor McDavid. And I'd like to give up three third round draft picks, but that's not the way it's going to work out.

The retool rebuild, that was curious because if you're an experienced candidate, and I mean, maybe it's Doug Armstrong, That whole thing is just a whirlwind of speculation, which is why I'm okay talking about it. I mean, I don't like the fact that this guy is under contract. And unless it happened today, so far the Maple Leafs have not asked St. Louis for permission to talk to Doug Armstrong. So we in the Toronto media have anointed this guy as the best candidate and the frontrunner. But, you know, and maybe he is by resume, right? maybe his relationship with Barube if he hangs in there.

I get all that. What if Doug Armstrong's view of what's needed in Toronto is way different than what we heard from Keith Pelly? You know, Keith Pelley talked about a retool. All right. Well, here's what I can tell you what. The Leafs believe they need at least one good young defenseman added. Okay.

So that guy comes in. You get rid of Morgan Riley somehow. I'm not sure how you acquire that young defenseman. and maybe using some of the draft picks that you acquired at the trade deadline. Then you shuffle the deck a little bit on the back end. You'll hope and pray that your goaltending does stabilize, as Red identified earlier,

because there's really not much they can do there, unless they use one of their goalies as trade bait, which is possible because they've got Hill to be coming, and he's going to need waivers to go back down next year. But they need pieces up front, not small pieces. They're big competitive guys and a centerman, to take some of the load off John Tavares. I mean, that's...

Two toughest things to find. Like a young defense man and a number two center. All right. And a goalie, if you can. Potentially a goalie, but certainly, what are we talking about? And on top of all of that, you've got to have a conversation again with Austin Matthews.

It will be two years out from the expiration of his contract. Okay, well, we think we're going to be okay this year, but we're not sure. Because you're going to have that conversation in May, right? You're not having it in July. You know, whatever he says, all right, well, I'll get back to you in a couple of weeks or a month. And I'll let you know what my thoughts are. I mean, there's some enormous questions come here.

Is Burby Dead Man walking in your mind? Not in my mind. I actually think, you know, I thought that was well played by Pellie and just saying, okay, well, I mean, we need him to finish the year. he's going to finish the year. And then, you know, with two years remaining on his deal, we'll leave that up to the new management group that will come in. I mean, it gets a little spice here when you've got somebody like Bruce Cassidy

who's recently gotten cut loose. But now, again, I go back to the woes of the Maple Leafs. If you're Bruce Cassidy, chances are you're going to have multiple options, right? I doubt very much that Toronto Maple Leafs are going to be top a list for Bruce Cassidy among coaching options. There could be teams that are way more established, especially with the uncertainty around Matthews and some of the other pieces that you would count on as cornerstones.

Boy, I look at it and Barubi looks frustrated to be there already, and this is sitting in Calgary and Mardaloup. So I'm a long, long ways away from it. But that looks like a coach that's frustrated with his group. If I'm another coach, I'm going, yeah, what have we got going on here? Like that whole thing, it's the Allura 67. If you ever do it, you'd be,

you're as far away as you've been in a long, long time. In the other than 10 years, yeah. Barouba, like, he's been frustrated basically all year. Yeah. I mean, frustrated that he hasn't been able to exercise, you know, a little bit more jam out of these guys to play the game that he needed them to play, that they showed at times last year, more than times. I would say more consistently last year they were able to play.

frustrated that, you know, Marner goes to the Vegas Golden Knights. Nick was a nice player, but they essentially got very little for Mitch Marner and weren't able to replace him, you know, through free agency or other means. And the fact that a defenseman, a right shot guy, especially,

that he's been screaming for forever, still hasn't materialized. So lots of reasons why Burube would be frustrated. I just don't like the whole thing that they're talking about is well no we got these core pieces we're going to build around them. Oh, we got this coach. He's not, you know, we're going to wait and see. Like, it's clear to me that this coach and this core hasn't worked. Yeah. And when he, the president talks about cohesiveness and culture and everyone been on the same page, like, I don't think this coach and this core works together. Agreed. I agree with that. Like, how is he not dead man walking? Yeah. If you're the next GM coming in. Yeah. We're your.

committed to getting different players, you know, you obviously can't swap them all out. But if one of the big boys gets traded and for me, it's Matthews or Nylander, you know, the return for either one of those players, you know, like, let's just be crazy here for a second. You know, if Austin Matthews legitimately were in play, what would that package look like? Like you'd get probably a decent young center back, probably a defenseman and maybe a first round pick or two first round picks. look at the random deal and ad because he got turned twice last year. Well,

maybe we're getting ahead of ourselves, but who's even in the boat to, everyone would want Matthews, you know, we can't get him in Calgary and can't fit him in. Like, what is he want? I heard San Jose once because they got that Mesa kid, maybe that's a, yeah, are there certain teams

that would be ahead of the pack as far as getting him? Well, impossible to say definitively. San Jose would make some sense to me. I wouldn't call him a front runner, but spitballing. Guys, I think Utah is going to be a big player here. I was going to say Utah feels.

They keep kicking tires, though. Like, they haven't been able to land. Well, but it's not, right? No. Until it happens, I'm just wondering. Like, we heard the same thing with Seattle. Like, oh, they offered 50 some million to Panera. And he said no.

Yeah. Like, it's a great sign for sale. I think it's a bad sign for Seattle. Yeah. It took less money. I just think that owner is. He wants it. I get that.

Yeah. You know, some people mention L.A., right? and they put this package together of Byfield and Clark and, you know, again, draft picks. Matthews is going to drive this bus if it gets to that point. And I'm not sure he looks at the L.A. King's roster and where they're headed and goes, all right, well, I mean, the future might be good in L.A. for a year or two. And then there's going to be a restructuring that's required there as well. So some of the other teams that we mentioned

Without again, knowing anything about anything In terms of what Austin Matthews wishes are, if it gets to that point, that's where he's going to control the whole process. Well, that's what I, we don't know, but do you get the vibe that Austin Matthews is desperate to go to a Stanley Cup contender? Or is he, I don't know, or maybe we shouldn't even speculate on it. More lifestyle. Is there lifestyle?

Yeah, is it taxes and lifestyle or is it winning? Ah, yeah. Nice to have a combination. Yeah, it's, I mean, the, the perfect scenario is, as you're right, it's, it's a combination. It, and, and I think if you're looking at, at San Jose, I mean, all right, San Jose isn't the prettiest part of California, but it's not a bad spot. I mean, you're not that far away. It's California. Yeah, it's California.

Utah, again, we're just pure speculating here. I mean, it's a nice spot. There's lots of reasons. But I think that more than lifestyle and more than where he's going to live, it's about the pieces on that team, how he would fit into that team if it gets to that point. And can he win for years to come? You know, not being the last piece of a puzzle,

maybe coming in the middle of the run and seeing where it goes from there.