Real Kyper & Bourne - Leafs Hour: Leafs Part Ways with Brad Treliving

Episode Date: March 31, 2026

The Toronto Maple Leafs have fired general manager Brad Treliving. Nick Kypreos, Justin Bourne and Sam McKee share their thoughts on the decision and the timing of Treliving's dismissal before going through each answer from Keith Pelley's press conference, including his comments on what went wrong this season, retooling vs. rebuilding, and the team's culture. Then, they assess where Craig Berube stands with seven games remaining in the regular season. Later, they look back on the Leafs' win over the Ducks, Max Domi's fight with Radko Gudas, and Michael Pezzetta's ejection. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Sports & Media or any affiliates.

Here we go. Just another day in Leafland. It is the real Kipper and Bourne show. We're live on SportsSet 360, 590 the fan in Toronto, streaming always on Sportsnet Plus. Also available Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube, where I'm sure the chat is going pretty strong already. It should be lively today.

On the Toronto Maple Leafs. Nick Kiprios, Justin Bourne, Sammy McKee, Jake the Snake Shultz, Derek Brandeo, the next two hours. We got a fantastic show. Of course, we'll break down everything in Leafland in this hour edition of our program. And then Steve Aliquette will join us on his regularly scheduled Tuesday. Yeah. In the meantime, MLSC CEO Keith Pelley spoke today.

And the search for a new man is wise. Wide open. Wide open. We got a lot of directions to go. You know, we haven't spoken on the show anyway since Tree Living got fired. We haven't spoken since the Goudas game last night. Oh, my gosh. We haven't spoken since the Prelli and Pelley conference.

Doesn't it feel like just too least ours? We could easily do. Doesn't it feel like a million years ago from our last show? Yes. Lots of changed, boys. Lots of changed. Lots of changed. Yes.

Lots has changed. That's what I'm trying to say. Words. I got to tell you, I know. I know our discussion in yesterday's show was a little surprising for you guys. What I mentioned that tree living could get fired as early as yesterday. It's like I almost don't even want to give you credit for it because you dropped it at 420. That's what I mean.

Like it would have been, you know, like, I don't think you're going to be that weird unless it was 426. But he mentioned it for the first time. Like a thousand people have told me it was actually 429, I think. But we've been grinding every day, talking about nothing, just trying to get through these last two weeks this season. And you get some piece of information that the general manager may not last a day. And you're like, ah, we'll get to it. We'll get to it.

You know what the problem is? No show meeting. It's the sponge between my ears. It's kind of soaked already. And there's stuff that I hear. And I'm like, it's in the sponge. Wow, that could be so interesting. And I'm like, then it's 559.

And I'm like, oh, I forgot to say that. I view my job. I should change my Twitter bio to the sponge squeezer. It's my job to figure out what's in there and ring it out over the hour. Bring it constantly. Honest to God. I don't know. It's just it dawned on me that maybe I should mention this because I heard it.

And I, yeah, I kind of chucked it to the side because it was game day and it's not going to happen, right? And the strangest of times to make the announcement by Keith Pelley and the MLSC, it was 830 guys, 830. Like we're an hour and a half from a pretty emotional game for the Toronto Maple Leafs, which we may touch on it. We may not have time. But I was absolutely shocked that it came down the pike And then we heard from Keith Pelly today And Elliot spoke of this last night on our show Which we covered Toronto and Anaheim

And he spoke of how Keith Pelley may have felt That Brad Trey Living was pushing on this sooner than later Which certainly was proven to be true As Keith Pelley talked about that today You love my relationship analogies someone's like, we'll talk about it later. It's like, no, we'll talk about it now. And that's true.

It was like, you tell me what's going on. If we need to have a talk, let's just have a talk. And they had a talk. Yeah. Where do you want to start? What's your first overall thought of Bradshaw living being let go, I guess? Yeah, I think that's the right place to start. I think it's the right decision.

I think this gives them a fresh chance at charting a new course, which they badly needed. Things have gone badly. I wrote last Friday that to me it was a tenure marked by indecisiveness and a lack of clear direction. Even if they stated a clear direction, their actions never followed that. And yeah, it felt like if they're going to get better and change things next year that this was going to happen. And here we are. Better now than in two weeks.

Yeah. Kip? Go ahead. Yeah, I thought it should have happened a lot earlier. Yeah. And I don't know. I think the game plan was for him to finish out the season. Don't you get that sense?

Yeah. Well, if he forced the hand, then it sounds like they weren't going to play the hand yet. So the question is, is how far does it go down? Because I get the sense that there's still going to be changes made. There should be changes made. There's a group of them that have been there a long time. How deep does he want to go and to change a few things, either from ownership or from Keith Pelley's perspective,

is this just the start? I don't think we got a real sense of that moving forward. And, you know, we'll talk about Keith Pelley's press conference momentarily. But certainly the start needed to be Brad Tree Living moving on. Yeah. So, Sam, why don't you weigh in as well? I just, I can't get over the fact that they were on the verge of allowing Brad for Living

to make franchise altering decisions this month. This month. March 6 was the deadline. March 8th was a deadline. And I don't know what's true. I'm not an insider, but I read a lot of stuff after that about Nyes and about other stuff and Willie

and whatever it was that they were thinking about doing. I just, I can't get over. But we don't know, Sam, for sure. Well, we don't know for sure, but there's enough smoke there to say that they were concerned. some pretty massive decisions. And I think you make the case,

they did make some big decisions. You know, if you want to win next year, they moved on from McMahon-Lin-Wlaw. No, but like, I just, I'm surprised that if they were just going to do it, it should have been done a long time ago. If, like, if the, they just thought that they were going to come out of the break

and get hot and all this stuff that we not, we all knew wasn't going to happen. And it just, it feels like it's just not run properly, to my, in my opinion. Yeah, I think that's a fair case to be made. That if it's, it wasn't proactive by any means. Correct.

You know, it didn't get out ahead of it. Like, here you are. Imagine, just imagine, for example, we don't know, I know we don't know for sure about Matthew Nyes, okay? But like, let's just say he got dealt to the Montreal Canadians at the deadline. And forever, whatever the package was. And then two weeks later, you fire the guy, like, did it? I just, I can't believe that they were willing to let him run that.

With all these people in charge that they, I mean, they have six assistant general managers. Like, you couldn't let one of them make a pick for a second round pick for Bobby McMahon? Like, I just, I mean, there was big names mentioned at that deadline and those deals didn't happen. I wonder if potentially they pulled back the reins on some of those big moves because they thought that maybe this would happen. Yeah. And that, that does happen that some general managers, even though they may know, their destiny can still move on a day-to-day position and still make some trades. Maybe it's like, okay, you can do these three, but you can't do these five.

And at the end, I don't know, maybe Brad might have had a deal with Montreal or somebody else. And maybe someone oversaw it and said, no, right, knowing that we're undecided on your future. So all of these things behind the scenes, we don't necessarily have the privilege of knowing. Right. Yeah. So it's hard to say overall, do you want to get to some Keith Pelly clips or do you want to get your overall thoughts of Keith's presentation today? Yeah, let's go there.

You want to go first? Yeah, sure. You know, I'd say the phrase you heard most often was structure, vision, tactics, you know, them trying to build out sort of a plan. You know, he talked quite a bit about what do you got? Yeah, no, no. I'm going with you on that. Well, what are the next steps, right?

And it's like, okay, well, we want to have a head of hockey ops was the word he used. He didn't say general manager. He didn't say president. A head of hockey ops, those people will define the vision. And then that leads to the tactics and that leads to your structure. That seemed to be the message he tried to convey about where they go. Yeah. And not overly surprised in terms of those type of terms.

I think they're safe terms. they're terms that are probably heard more often in an HR department than they are in in halk hockey culture business too business right more business type of chatter yeah but not certainly jargon if you will hockey jargon no it was yeah corporate jargon okay corporate jargon but certainly not hockey talk for say and i think he he was much more careful than we've seen him in the past. And I thought his first, what, 10, 15 minutes, he read off of it a lot, which says that he was much more careful on the words that he chose and how he chose them and how he structured them. And I wouldn't expect anything less. This was a very important press conference for him.

Yeah. And for the most part, I think I got exactly what I thought I was getting at the end of it. he avoided, I think, the places that he could get himself tangled up for the most part. I thought it got a little tricky at times for him. Certainly when it came to mentioning other teams in the division, which kind of got him maybe a little bit tangled a little bit, but he was smart enough to kind of get back out of it real quick here. But, you know, he didn't come across today speaking as if he knows how to make the sausages. You know what I mean?

But so when I look at the whole thing from Peli today, I come away from that. And my one thought is the guy has one thing to do now. And that is to hire people who know hockey. And so whether that be three people he's got to hire or two people or whatever, or if it's just a president, president in GM. I don't think he'll hire the coach. The coach will probably come from those people. This whole thing, he can say all the words in the world.

His job now is to pick the right, one to two people. And so it's as simple as that. Whatever you want to say about vision direction. I didn't like that he said data centric. I didn't like that he mentioned the Buffalo Sabres. You can, whatever. He's got to pick a couple of guys. And that's the important part.

And that's what he's going to set out to do. Okay, let's go to Keith Pelley and clip one on his role from here on. forward. Now I've heard a lot of comments, a lot of comments over the course of the season about my role as CEO and involvement in team decisions. So I want to do away with that right away. Let's do away with that right now. I'm not here to be a scout. I'm not here to be a coach. I'm not here to be a general manager. And I have no desire on giving any input on who should play wing. I am here to create the overall vision, the strategy, put the structure, put the process, put the pillars in place to develop the right culture for us to have a winning and a contending

team year after year. Go ahead, Sam. You know, you hear him talk, I think one of the questions I would ask Lee fans and, you know, people who are feeling sort of like I am about the person. conference today where, you know, I wasn't totally in love with it. What could he have said today that are going to make you feel good? I think the answer is nothing. Because that's what I'm...

It's just... I have a ton of criticisms bouncing through my head, but I just, I think that we're at a point with this franchise and the relationship with the team where no matter what anyone says right now, they're going to be like, oh, that's crap. Oh, that's, this makes no sense. There's nothing possible that he could have said today that would have made anybody feel better, right? Without really throwing a lot of BS going around.

Yeah, like, let's be honest. He did the best that he could. They want to win. They want to win now. You know, you can say, oh, I disagree. They should tear it all down, whatever. They still are trying to win. They've said, he said that it's a rebuild.

Sorry, it's a retool, not a rebuild. That's still part of the... Well, I just, you know, you can say whatever he wants to say in the press conference, okay? And like, we can quibble with some of the stuff. We're going to play some of these clips. We'll do our quibble. What I hope is the plan.

And he said in that quote there, that I'm not here to talk about the left wing. I'm not here to talk about whatever, is that he's going to hire somebody that he trusts to just make every hockey decision. Yeah. That he puts there, it's Doug Armstrong, it's certainly not going to be Jim Nell,

because the stars snapped him up pretty quick today. But whoever it is, that's the person that's going to be making the decisions on the personnel below him, as opposed to Keith Pelly making the decisions on the personnel below him. So when I hear that clip, that's kind of what I think. Yeah. Right? Is that the right thing to take away from that? I do, yes, I do think it's the right thing.

And, you know, there's, yeah, let's get into some of these clips here. Why don't we just, do want to move through them, Kip? Is that good? I'll just go on to what's the plan? interest you. Well, I mean, that was the first question. Josh Cooperton was literally just said, what is the plan? Yeah. And this was the answer. Okay. Well, I think the plan is, um, when I talk about structure, I talk about organizational structure. So it always starts with organizational structure. Once you have a structure in place, then you put the people in place.

You have the strategy, then you have the tactics, and then you move forward. And if you have alignment and accountability, and that allows you to, to be able to, to be able to, both players to be accountable to each other, coaches to be accountable to each other, front office to be accountable to each other, alignment on the vision, alignment on the strategy, then you have an opportunity for success. So that's what we'll start building today.

So that means, yeah, that's just a lot of fluff. Literally, me. Yeah, that is. And that when I'm talking about the quibbles, yes, yeah. It's the first thing where it's like... We're going to align the vision of the structure and the... That's not a plan.

That's not a plan. There's this TikTok account I follow that literally is just like these talking heads doing like Zoom meetings where it's just like them saying things like that. That's what that was. Yeah. I don't understand. Yeah. I'm not a business guy, clearly.

But anything outside of that answer could tangle them up, could get them in trouble. Well, and like if we pick that, thing apart it makes sense like yeah you got to get there have a structure you got to have i think he learned a lot from his comments back in october on uh it's go time and it's uh um i have the culture's great i mean unity chemistry great skill he got himself in a little bit of hot water there and i think he learned a lot yeah going into today so stay safe he he he gave no indication on on probably the answer that Sammy

and many in Leafland wanted for a plan. When he says a plan, what I would love. What did you want? What do you want here? Back in the playoffs next year. No, we're going to hire a president of hockey ops. We're going to hire a fresh new face of general manager and we're going to move on from there.

But he said that, Sam. He did that. He did that. Later on, he didn't say it. No, to me, a plan is that we're going to fast track this and get back into the plan. playoffs as early as next year. That's a plan.

Okay? And you can't say that because that's up in the... I'm going to quibble with you here. It's like you can't do that because number one, you don't know if it's true. And number two, you know, it's going to come back and haunt you. Yeah. You know, my quibble with what you're saying is like,

I hear a lot of people saying about this Leafs team, okay, they want to run it back next year. They want to make playoffs next year. That's not a plan. That's a goal. A plan is how you do it. The plan is how you do it. The plan is.

is we're going to trade, you know, I know Pelley's would never say this, but we were going to trade Matthew Nyes for this guy and that guy or we're going. So he has a goal or a vision. He's going to hire someone with a plan. Yes. To get to that vision or goal. That's right. Like there is no right answer to you have a plan because nobody ever gives you their plan anyways.

Right. We don't need. Right. Why am I going to tell you my plan? And also, I'm hiring someone who's supposed to come up with a good plan. I just told you. who these guys are. Which essentially, again, he did. It took him a while to get there, but it's like my plan is to get somebody in here that can implement all the things that I talked

about and then go to work. Would you like to know what went wrong in Keith Pelley's eyes this year? Of course. Clip three, a little longer one. I thought we had the right leadership in place. There are a number of factors that played into it this season. Without getting into the detail, I honestly believe that we We didn't need we didn't have the alignment. We didn't have the culture. We didn't have the structure that we needed to be successful And you can point to a number of of issues re this year. I'm not going to talk about injuries the only thing that I would say is we need to be better

We need to be able to adapt quicker and we definitely Didn't see the train coming which was the Buffalo Savers and the Montreal Canadians and how strong those two teams are, along with the likes of Detroit and Ottawa, Boston with a strong spine have been able to retool, and Florida and Tampa are always strong. But Buffalo and Montreal have shown that young, energetic team, they're going to be here for a long time. The prospects that they have from Michael Hagey from Montreal to Radam Merca from Buffalo they're strong

and they're going to be strong for a long period of time and the Atlantic Division is a really strong division and we're going to really have to improve and be good to compete and win the Atlantic Division again. Wow, that's a lot there. A lot there. Where do you want to start? I mentioned earlier about

bringing up other teams and I can appreciate it. Like we all know that they're getting better, but they didn't keep you out of the playoffs. You, you're stinking. Your team's not good this year is the reason why you're not in the playoffs. It's not because they got better. We didn't anticipate other teams also winning games is not ideal.

The one thing I would say, if I was the head coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs and one of the criticisms of what went wrong this year was that we need to adapt quicker, I wouldn't feel great. I wouldn't feel like I was on very solid ground. To me, that is a comment about the team did not make quick adjustments, which is on the head coach.

I got to ask, what do you make him bringing up H? and then hagging the press conference? Not good. I think he was around on trade deadline day. He said that he was around, right? Just to supervise, just to see the structure and how to, and I feel like those may be names that he heard. Yeah.

Otherwise, why would he know the depth process? of division rival. Yeah. I've... Yeah. Anyway. It's not good. Like, you need... I've been around this.

I've been around Gary Batman long enough. They don't like that. Well, he's just... I mean, those are... No, no. You don't... You don't... Good players. It's not... It's not something that'll cost you a big fine or

a draft pick. It's not tampering, but it's it's frowned upon. To even mention that other teams have good prospects? It's not the right thing to do. Yeah? Yeah. How about one of the big questions that's been looming in Lees Nation,

a rebuild or retool? All right. He alluded to that. Let's go to clip eight, Pally Clip Eight, please, Derek. But you talked about a retool or a rebuild. The way I look at it is a rebuild is needed when you are, are starting from scratch. We all know that Toronto Maple Leafs have foundational pieces in place.

So as a result, with those foundational pieces in place, if we're able to surround them with the right culture, with the right structure, with the right personnel, both on and off the ice, then I would say that we would be in a retool, not in a rebuild. Having said that, again, I will always wait for input from the new head of hockey operations. So Doug Armstrong, he hires Doug Armstrong, let's just say, okay,

name that's out there. And Doug Armstrong is like, Keith, it's done, bud. Is he listening? Yes, yes, he is. I mean, I think that he's stating that, you know, someone is going to come in and he's going to take their input. I don't think he'd hire someone. However, if he doesn't want that input and that's not the direction they want to go,

then maybe that maybe he doesn't want to hire that. that guy then. I think that's a comment about Austin Matthews, right? We just listened to him talk about Matthews. Am I wrong there? Foundational pieces. Well, he earlier mentioned the leadership, right? He mentioned the missed leadership

on what went wrong. And then he just spoke moments ago about surrounding the foundational pieces, which is Austin, which is Willie, and which is Matthew eyes with the right culture.

And see, this is where I differ with Keith Pelly, is that those guys are supposed to have the right culture and they're supposed to surround others around it. Keith's got it the other way around. They are the culture. They are, they're supposed to be your culture. It's always been the problem. Okay? And he can't go and hire a general manager.

I don't care if it's the greatest guy in history. in history or an unknown, they won't come in and set your culture up for those guys. It has to be those guys setting the culture up. And that has to be addressed. You know, I think there's a world where, you know, there's a real conversation to be had about do those guys, can those guys be a part of a positive culture?

You know, I think Austin Matthews is a pretty smart guy and pretty flexible. You saw him really be embraced by and embraced the American team at the Olympics. And I think he can do that. Willie is a bigger question for me. Like, it's almost like if someone were to come in above Matthews and Willie, someone who meant a lot here,

a huge name somehow, you know, Willie's always just going to be Willie. And so, right, that's the quote. I've heard that for years. I know. I hate that, that comment,

that philosophy, the it's just not good enough anymore. I know, Kip. So this is why I bring him up versus Matthews. If you're coming in here and saying, we have to surround our guys with culture, I think you have to look at those guys. My point is I think Austin could be a part of a positive culture.

I don't know if Willie is a foundational piece of a different culture. I think he's just going to be the guy who's been. And I like Willie, unlike you, but I totally hear that complaint. It's a very valid criticism. Calling him a foundational piece is pretty strong for me. of the next group? I mean, of a foundation.

I don't know what the foundation. I don't know what that house is looking like. Yeah. I think I'm okay with it because there might be 31 other teams out there that could look at him and go, oh, I just bring him in and he could take us over the top. So foundational meaning that these guys are game changers, game changing talent, world-class talent,

people that can bring people out of their seats. talent and Keith's right that they are they are really good pieces either they're going to help you win in the next few years or they can turn themselves into two three or four good pieces into your next wave of of top end talent so I do agree with Keith that that they're not starting from scratch they have a few pieces to work with for sure but feeling like Austin Matthews, you could still win a Stanley Cup with him leading the way, I think is a stretch at best at this point. Yeah.

Really hard to sit here and disagree with that. Yeah, I'm on the other side of that from you guys. But no, but like, I don't necessarily agree, but it's hard to sit here and be like, no, you're wrong. That's exactly it. You're not going to, you're not going to sit there and double down on it. You're just going to hope, right? Yeah.

That's what you're left with. Whether it be Iserman or Ovechkin or whoever, eventually you hope they figure it out. Clip five. How about on what the organizational structure will look like? This is an interesting one. I think the way that I look at it is there's not a definitive one way to run the operation. As I said, we have the resources. So we're going to determine what is the best structure to run it.

You probably know there's 12 teams that run it with a president and a general manager that separately. There's eight teams that run it that the president and the GM is one person. and then there's 12 teams that only have a general manager. So there's no right or wrong way to actually run it. What I think we have the ability to do with the structure and the support of ownership that we have is to put a structure in place that gives us the best chance to win and gives us the best chance to have the most hockey expertise possible. I can't tell you, right, because somebody asked me this internally,

in terms of one of the keys to the candidate that you may be looking for, is they have to be data-centric. They have to really understand data and the importance of data and where data is moving. We have just completed a complete rebuild of TFC, all using data combined with cultural checks. Okay, so this is more up your alley, okay? Is Justin Bourne?

Are you going to fire off your... So you're going to find your resume? Have a chat. I'm not in tune as much as you are. But my understanding is from even, you know, Kyle's days, that they're on top of this already. They have a data center. They have people aligned.

Darryl Medcalf, to me, is the guy there. Yeah. Right? Yeah. He's the head of that department. So they have everything that they need out of data. Totally. I don't know where Keith thinks is the next level to it.

Every piece of information that is out there is already available to them. If you plugged in Troy Stetcher's last 20 breakouts, how many under pressure, how many were from the left side, the right, they can get all of that like that. Yeah. So where is the feeling now that they've been undervalued in this area? I think fundamentally it's that you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink. So if you're a data department who comes to your general manager and says, you know, we think we've got an undervalued guy in Long Island or on Long Island that we could get out of there.

And they say, nah, I don't like him. He's soft. You know, they, you know, I think you need someone who is interested in this information and can, From everything I hear, it wasn't that big of a problem for Brad Tree Living. Well, whether it was or it wasn't, Keith Pelly thinks that it's important for the next guy to respect. Okay. All right. That's fair. I'm surprised to hear you say that because I feel like he wouldn't have brought that up at this press conference.

Brad for Living was super open to it. Like the fact that he went out of his way to say that tells me that there may have been, I don't know, friction. But like some disagreements on the way that is used. What's crazy is like every team in the NHL has it now. Of course. It's no longer like, oh, these organizations do it so they're getting ahead. It's like you either do it or you're behind and I'm pretty sure every team does it. So, you know, the next wave is finding people who can understand the information and use it to make practical decisions.

I would say, we can't sit here today and say, who have the Leafs dug up with their analytics department? That you're like, oh, the Leafs are the Smartorg, they found that guy. that hasn't really happened, right? I mean, we haven't seen a ton of it. There would probably be some dubious ones. There are some dubious ones where he picked up a couple good guys. But like, as a player development staff, which is gigantic, have they done an exceptional job past the next?

No. I don't know. So they have some bloat, I think, where there's smart people, good people, but it hasn't produced enough for them. Yeah. And the other thing, too, he referenced a couple times, we have the resources. And it's like, there's, there's,

There's just a sense that because you're richer than everyone else, that you should be able to buy your way out of this. But it should give you a leg up somehow. It should help. It shouldn't hurt. This is their biggest advantage where there is a salary cap. They could spend whatever they want. I think it's already there.

It's there already and it's been there this whole time. Totally. Totally. That's not like. So keep spending more and eventually we'll buy our way into some success. I think it's just, I think it's too easy to think that because, Because you're the richest team in the league, you should have this huge advantage. But I didn't think he was saying that.

It's never been there. That's the way I interpreted. I interpreted it as we have no excuses. Like, we, we've been doing this. We have this. But we know that already. Right. We aren't giving you excuses.

I think that was his, like, attempted accountability. Like, I think what it means is that our boy Sonny should get his resume ready. Yeah, I don't think it hurts. I think I'd be firing it off to old Keith pretty soon here. If, like, when you're saying data, I'm sure. there's a lot of guys across the league whose ears perked up pretty significantly when he heard the president of the Leaf say that.

But at the same time, it sounds like he wants someone, right, with some experience who's been around. That's the mix. It's the hockey man at the top and the quote-unquote nerve underneath. Oh my God, no. Bring him back. Oh, my God.

Give it another try. Run it back. Buddy, how many times did the Yankees hire Billy Martin? You fire a mid-press conference. Let's go to break. But before we go to break, but before we go to break, little acts of kindness in a time when it seems everything is hopeless is one small thing you can make things better.

And one simple act you can take today to have a direct and immediate impact on your community is donating blood at your nearest Canadian blood services donation center. This small act can save multiple lives. The need is always there and it can bring a sense of contribution to a world in need of solutions. Choose a moment of hope today.

Make a donation appointment by visiting blood.ca the give blood app or call 1-88 to donate. You guys want to talk about the hockey game last night or no? Oh. Nothing happened, right? Man, I guess. There was a hockey game last night? I think.

But I'm mistaken. Okay, we should take a quick break. We should probably talk about Barubei too. Yeah, oh no, we still got a ton here. We should probably have two hours. Sorry, Valley, we're just doing two hours. Hey? Yeah, anyways.

We'll hit the break and come back. Okay. As producer Sammy just alluded to, plenty more on our conversation on the firing of Brad Tree Living. CEO Keith Pelley's press conference, Goudis, Domi, and Steve Aliquette at the top of the hour, don't go away.

Real Kipperman Born returns after these words. The best Blue Jays show out there, period. Blair and Barker. Be sure to subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's the Leap Hour edition of the Real Kippenboron show. Nickyiprios, Justin Bourne. Sammy McKee.

So much talk over Brad Tree Living the last, what, 20 hours or so, has left head coach Craig Bruby out there. We did hear from Keith Pelly on his future. Not reassuring, but not certainly imminent in terms of Craig going anywhere at this point. Let me ask you, though, what's the point? But why? Yeah, well, you know, like, I understand that he said today if whoever comes in here is going to be a part of making the decision on who the head coach is.

Do you want to hear the clip? Yeah, yeah, let him say it. Let's do clip seven, please. And Keith Pelley. I think Craig Barooby is the head coach, and that is determined by the general manager or the president of hockey or the head of hockey operations, that's not decided by myself. So his role of the hockey club doesn't change today, other than the fact is that he will

work closer with Brendan Pridham and Ryan Hardy. Once we have a new head in hockey in place, if that recommendation is around Craig Brube at that particular time, we will listen and something as big as Craig Brewery would go all the way to ownership. Wow. All the way to... It's... Yeah, so he gets to say on the general manager,

but not the coach, and the coach goes to ownership. That's... You'd think it would be the other way around. Yeah. Right? Based on the importance of the job. But I think that it would go to ownership as just like, hey, we've made this decision.

Are we cool with, you know, spending this money sort of thing? Not like, do you think we should fire the coach sort of thing? Yeah. Okay. I don't think does Brad have an extension? past this season? I don't know. Brad had one more year, I think.

Craig has more than one year. I think two more years. The Bruby thing to me, I've long believed that a good coach can take a average roster and gain you five wins over the course of a season. I think a bad coach can really hurt your team. And I don't even mean that Craig is a bad coach here when I start this whole thing. I mean that you have to establish buy-in and he hasn't done that. The guys have not bought in to what he's trying to do.

So you have to have a fresh start next year. You just have to. Can I ask you guys? The losses look so much the same over the course of the season where they're just like every defensive mechanism is amongst the worst in the league. Yes. And to your point like that you got to find a way to look different. You do.

You just need to do it different. Can I ask you guys why not just like I know that the timing was weird and I guess he was afraid of the leaks or whatever that was happening last night and they wanted to get ahead of it and blah blah blah, but like could you not have just made an announcement today that both of them are done? It felt like Tree forced their hand. Yeah, but like, so. Into what?

Burubi didn't. And to say, and hey, if I'm gone, just let me go. So. Well, Barubi could too or maybe he's wants to validate himself here. You're going to make him do the, like, just let him go. I made the comment last night that I just thanked for one more night. tree living announcement could have become at 10 or 11 a.m. or noon today. Yes. And have Barubei included in that?

But I mean, so. I think he's, Keith tried to be respectful, I think, to Brad. And he's probably doing the same thing for Barabie with seven games to go. Yeah. You know, if I'm talking to Pelley right now, maybe he would say, what's the point? Someone, you know, we're just trying to get to the end of the year now. You know, he's the coach. We pay him to coach. Let's just get to the end of the year and sort it out.

And I do, you do have the angle that you're going to have someone new come in and officially make that decision. I guess there's a chance that you hire someone who says, I got to have him. How many times does that happen where a guy comes in and gets inherited a coach? What's funny is Doug Armstrong is so heavily rumored to come here and he just fired him. Yeah, wasn't it, didn't he do that with Hartley? or somebody he took over and they kept the coach. Well, I mean, it's happened here in Toronto. No, but anyways, you gave him a little bit of attention.

Okay, it's okay. Anything else from this list that you cared about, Kipper? You talked about bearing all the responsibility on pursuing people under contract. That was interesting. Oh, let's listen to that. Yeah, let's have a list in a clip 10. This is a short and sweet one.

Clip 10. I'm comfortable doing anything that gives the Toronto May beliefs the best chance to win the Stanley Cup, period. end of story. So the question was, are you comfortable pursuing people who are under contract elsewhere? And I'll just add to that. It happens all the time. People get pursued under contract. Yes. Yeah. As long as it's done under the right channels, right? But are the right channels? And I mean, that sincerely not. The right channels is you either call an owner or someone just underneath them. and you simply ask,

I have interest in so and so, would you grant me permission to talk to him? And that's it. Yeah. And the Dallas Stars said, Jim, new contract in your office today. Yeah. I mean, that's...

That's how that works. That's how it works. And that's it. And it's either yes, no, or let me get back to you. That's like when SportsNet got the NHL rights for the first time, and everyone at TSN got a new...

contract in the next week. Honestly, like, the Jim Nail thing is obviously connected. Yes. Like, there's just no way you could ever convince me that they... Yeah, maybe. I don't think they hide that even. There's no shame in that. Hey, other guys want our guy.

We want our guy, too. Here's your money. You can... Sometimes sometimes you... Usually, hockey clubs, if they have a high-end executive that they don't have... room to advance

usually get the go ahead the go ahead they get serious consideration to being let go the name you're hearing most is Doug Armstrong Mike Gillis was mentioned today that one is mentioned Mike Gillis

yeah he wants back in really badly does he? Yeah it's a good job been a while yeah hockey game yeah so

so Leaves played the ducks last night yeah no surprise on the first shift. I thought you had a good piece last night on the broadcast. If you missed it, Elliot asked why Domi would be, why not Pizzetta, why whatever, and you explained. Yeah, at usually under those circumstances,

which don't come around very often, and you've got a lot of time on the back of the bus in dressing rooms, waiting for a plane to take off, The boys would have talked about it countless times on how they wanted to handle Goudis and the first shift. And what usually happens is the guy with the most seniority gets to rule the conversation. And that would have been maxed at 800 games followed by Carlo at 650. 700.

Oh, please do it. Followed by Benoit. Oh, you can have it. Oh, no, I don't get to fight. Followed by Dakota. Followed by Pizzata. Right. And Pazetta just has to sit there and be quiet.

You know, I got to give Goudas, who got his face caved in and then got dragged around a lot of credit just for being there. It sounds like Goudis won't play the rest of the week is kind of what I'm hearing. Like he's hobbling around their dressing room. I have zero respect for Raggo Gudis. Well, that's fine. He's been flying around, throwing out knees, injuring people, get to spend his own career.

I don't mean I respect the way he plays, but the fact that he made himself available to take a lick in last night. This is the bare minimum. Boys, we talked about this. I said, like, he's just going to sit there and, like, honestly, pull a chair up at center ice and just have them just chuck boulders at you. So you don't let to throw a punch? No, that is unheard of Kip.

understand what you're saying i've never seen it before i didn't like it at all now the guys you know can't play for a week with his ankle like he's still they're dragging him around the ice didn't help him it didn't help his ankle no i know but that's why it's like you know i i said i respect it i guess i respect the nobility of being like i know the code of hockey and here i am but yeah i'm more confused than ever on the code well that's last thing was the most confusing code night ever that says you have to sit there and not fight that and take punches like that because you feel you deserve it. You know, it's like,

not on my team, bud. Not on, like, if I'm Pat Verbeek, that's not a proud moment for me. Totally agree. You're your captain at Center Ice getting teed off. Yes.

Like after crying all day in the media about how I'm not a bad guy. And saying, thank you, may I have another. And may I have another. Embarrassing. I don't get it. Yeah. Ratko's embarrassing in general.

You know, the idea of, you know, showing up, of just showing up and being there for that, though, Like there's not, it's not nothing to me. He, they continued to get, you know, you got a jump by Pazetta, McCabe tried to go at him. Good for the Leafs. I am, I am a little fascinated by the whole,

you see, there's a headline today. Leafs and Ducks combined for 85 penalty minutes. It's like I've seen that in a single scrum. The most under, the most under Brad Tree Living. Was it really? I don't think any games gone past that many penalty minutes. And I was thinking around the NHL,

it's probably less common to. see a nine-goal game than it is to see an 85-pim game. Like, it wasn't a circus. So I missed Sean McKenzie. Did he speak of Troy, Terry, being the only guy in NHL history to have played 50 games.

Zero hits? And have zero recorded hits. And I think he has 73 games or something. Like, he's got a lot. Please tell me you can accidentally bump somebody. I would hang up my gear, I think. That's one of the most embarrassing things. things I've ever heard. You're a forward. You've never been in on the forecheck. The hometown score has got to give them a hit. Sorry.

Like, give them. Oh, gosh. I can't mean like that. You can't even accidentally on purpose ever do that or predict that you could get there. How many is Willie throw a year? 70? No way. How many does Willie have this here? No way. I don't know. I don't know that. I am, but whatever the number. My God. What a strange. I don't... Strange stat. Sell myself as a tough guy, but I bump into someone every game.

I don't know if I want to get... I thought them throwing Posetta out was a joke last night. I think, like, abusive officials. Posetta is out there. Like, it's a short leash. Sure. Okay.

And, like, just... It's not... It's not overly shocking that they threw them out. I think it's good game. management when you're worried about the game going a certain way. It's game management, which is one of the things that pisses people off the most about NHL officiating where, like... To wait till it happens?

Well, the fact that he got screamed out by the ref after trying to go out a guy, which this happens a hundred times a year. Yeah. The fact that this happens, and so he goes to the box and Wes McCallie's like, time to make it about me and goes over and throws him out. Look it. He gets yelled at off to the box. And then they...

So they sit there and they think about it. Good job by Ryan Gibbs. That line he did a good job. You guys are both hockey players. You've been in a hundred scrums in your lives. That's the most soft abusive official call I've ever seen. It's definitely preemptive. It's more protecting the ducks.

It's more like, so the leaves are dressed. They finally dress a goon. It's just avoiding the trouble saying. I'm sure they would have to toss somebody out in Florida and they have a zoo. I don't think they care. I'm dying to give you the stat on Willie Hits. What is it? Nine.

Nine? This year? Yeah. Okay, well, that's nine times. Matthias Michelli has 19. You know. Oh, I wanted to ask you about Stolars there. I'm just, I hope that official can recover from that abuse.

Stolars bump in, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, Huso. Who so. Like. Stolars who's been made of rock candy. Buddy, I like, I liked it. I liked it. I liked it.

I like, please tell me. Good. Please tell me. that that hit he took last night was harder than the one he took from Bennett. Yeah, but Kip, you know how it is with like heads? It's not like it's like an awkward, whatever. If he's good to go, he's good to go.

Yeah, he definitely took a pretty good lick there. So you can get up from that and almost get into a fight. Come on. What's the point you're trying to make here? My point is, that's the only case you make him. I don't know about this guy. I just don't know this guy, right?

It's unpredictable. You don't know whether one second he's at the hospital, he's going to leave or he's going to want to fight a goalie. I would have loved to see. Stoller's got it. Is he the biggest goal in the league? Must be. He can't be that worried about your head or your neck

if you want to go and fight a goalie. He wants to be a part of it. He wants him. Yeah, so let's just all say a prayer for that official after that abuse. Dakota Joshua, 188 hits, first on the league. because Zeta was trying to get that last night. He was running around. I love it.

I told you. I love Fizzetta. Me too, man. Before the season. Couldn't have got 20 games this year? No. All right. We get Steve Aliquette's thought on all of this, including Allmark.

Back in that tonight, well rested. Steve Aliquette, when we return, we go national next on the Real Kipper and Morn show. Do not go away.