The Sheet with Jeff Marek - On the Sheet: Jay Rosehill on Matthews' Legacy, the Leafs Trade Deadline, and more

Episode Date: February 26, 2026

Jay Rosehill from TheLeafsNation joins to assess Auston Matthews at the Olympics, the Toronto Maple Leafs dilemma ahead of the deadline, their matchup against the Tampa Bay Lightning, and how Toronto fans should celebrate Matthews Saturday night against the Ottawa Senators.Leave a voicemail: https://www.speakpipe.com/TheSheetEmail us: [e-mail] TO OUR SPONSORS!!👍🏼 Fan Duel: https://www.fanduel.com/👍🏼Uber Eats: https://www.ubereats.com/caReach out to [e-mail] to connect with our Sales Team and discuss opportunities to partner with us!If you liked this, check out:🚨 OTT - Coming in Hot Sens | https://www.youtube.com/c/thewallyandmethotshow🚨 TOR - LeafsNation | https://www.youtube.com/@theleafsnation401🚨 EDM - OilersNation | https://www.youtube.com/@Oilersnationdotcom🚨 VAN - CanucksArmy | https://www.youtube.com/@Canucks_Army🚨 CGY - FlamesNation | https://www.youtube.com/@FNBarnBurner🚨 Daily Faceoff Fantasy & Betting | www.youtube.com/@DFOFantasyandBetting____________________________________________________________________________________________Connect with us on ⬇️Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/daily_faceoff💻 Website: https://www.dailyfaceoff.com🐦 Follow on twitter: https://x.com/DailyFaceoff💻 Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dailyfaceoffDaily Faceoff Merch:https://nationgear.ca/collections/daily-faceoffReach out to [e-mail] to connect with our Sales Team and discuss opportunities to partner with us! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's one of the most interesting teams in the NHL. No, not the Edmonton Oilers. We dealt with him a little bit yesterday, although some interesting comments from Leon Dreisdell doubling down on what he said before the break. Here's Jay Rose Hill to talk to us about the Toronto Maple Leafs and their returning captain, Rosie. Oh, by the way, I thought a lot about you during the Olympics because of one tweet. You know what that was? What was my tweets during the Olympics?

No, let me know. I was throwing a bunch of stuff out. Nathan, you're Nathan McKinnon theory. I'm like, ooh, you know what? Because there was, you know,

the talk and the rumors of not being great and not skating and then you're missing an open net and your Nathan McKinning crying out loud. That one really, that one stopped me in the tracks. Like, you know, you scroll,

you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, got, got, whoa. And it's like, okay,

I'm going to put this down and think about this now. Yeah. There's a speed on tweet. I was laying in bed in the dark. and thinking about the whole deal, as people tend to do. And I was just like, dude, that's not, that's not him. He's not indecisive. He doesn't, you know, panic.

He doesn't double clutch. He doesn't overthink. He's one of the greatest in the world. And I've always said he's one of the top guys out there that I would salivate to build a franchise around. He's got all the stuff. And I mean, that backdoor play was so uncharacteristic of him. You've seen him score right from there with absolute ease, with a lot less to shoot at,

with a bunch less time and space. And then in overtime there, the puck was coming right to him. I was like, oh, good, he's got it. And then he went, oh, oh, and then he kind of back. And he totally hesitated and second guessed himself. The opponent gets it, throws it, and it's over. And it's not Nathan McKinnon. And you go back and think about the times he got bonked and the times he,

And I'm like, I just feel like he was concussed. It's not hard, contrary to popular belief, to have your bell wrong and not tell anyone about it and not get pulled out of the game and not get the spotters Yankew. It made complete sense to me. Okay, let me, let me pause on that. So a good friend of mine, her name is Dr. Ali Rendelley. And she's worked with Dr. Charles Tater before. And actually, Dr. Tater let her cut skulls open for concussion research. So I remember she called me when she was like,

Dr. Tater, let me cut a skull for the first time. That was so cool. But Ali's awesome. And she always reminds me. She says, you hockey guys are really dumb. And I said, what do you mean? She goes, you think you get concussions just by getting hit in the head. She said, I deal with people because this is part of what she does.

She also runs a COVID, a long-term COVID rehabilitation center. She said, I deal with more people who get concussions from getting hit in the stomach than I do from getting hit in the head. head. She said, your problem isn't hits in the head. Your problem is hockey. Your problem is contact to begin with, like getting pushed from the back, getting punched in the stomach. She said, all that has to happen is your skull just your brain just needs to hit your skull. You think it only happens when your head gets hit. It can happen all the time. So when you mention like getting bounced around and getting hit all the time, it might not be obvious where it happens, but just contact itself can bring that on. So I'm glad you bring that up, Jay.

Yeah, I look back to Sidney Crosby and all the time that he'd missed in his career, kind of in the midpoint of his career, it was dire for him. It was looking scary like his career could be in jeopardy. And luckily, it looks like he's overcome that. But there were some times where he went out for considerable amounts of time where his head wasn't touched at all. But you're rattle around and, you know, everything is connected in the body as we know. But unfortunately, what we don't know is the problem.

You don't have, it's not like you can go get an MRI. you can see that you have a concussion. It's not like there's an x-ray. It's like, oh, there's your concussion right there. It's not that simple. And it's unfortunate that as much as we do know and as great as modern science and medicine is, we don't know much about the brain. We just don't.

And why can an MMA guy get knocked out cold on his feet, fall back, completely limp, smash his head off the mat and then get two hammer fists right in the head, again, as he's unconscious. And that's been going on for years and years and years and years. and there's not like this obvious, like I'm sure that's an issue in their sport, but it's not like, well, that guy did that and therefore here's his injury. And then there's guys that, like you say, I know guys that I've played with where it's like, you didn't even get your head hit and you can't sit in a lit room.

You can't look at your phone. You can't watch a screen. It's the biggest problem with this concussion business is it's so hard to identify and so hard to prevent. You know, and I do wonder, like this is going to happen. Like this is future, future generations, you know, you and me are just going to be a, memory if we're lucky by the time that this really rolls around. I wonder if one day, generations from now, people look back at this era and look at,

you mentioned MMA, that's one of them. They look at boxing. They look at football and they look at hockey and say, what were you people doing? Yeah. What were you thinking? Well, it's like watching a hockey game right now. And it's full contact. They're swinging their sticks around.

They're shooting puck. They're on ice. There's boards. And everyone's got chin pads on and elbow pads. But just don't bother with the helmet. Even the goalies are getting clappers. And you look at Johnny Bauer back in the day and eating them off his head. Like, did no one think maybe we should throw some piece of equipment on our head? So it's just the evolution of that.

And I mean, you look back at, you know, I think I was in, I don't know, 30 to 35 fights in one season. Those are bare knuckle fights. And it looks like my kids hear that. And they're like, that's insane. like I don't have anything to relate that to. That just doesn't happen anymore. And that's because of what you just said, the progression. But inevitably, if you want to talk about those things,

whenever someone's against fighting, I'm like, well, if you really want to prevent these things, you have to take body contact out of the sport. You have to make it non-contact, and that would alleviate a lot of concussions. And obviously everyone has a different opinion on whether that is something to even talk about or whether they want that or whether it's up to the players.

But yeah, like you say, when we're long gone in the dust is in our bones, it's very likely people look back at our era and say, you guys were seriously like signing up to box and do MMA and play hockey and play football. And yeah, that's fine. It's, again, maybe that's just a product of not knowing a whole lot about our brains, to be honest. There's a big, I have a pet theory about the presence of the boards and reality versus non-reality that you see. see in hockey that you don't see in other sports because there is no out of bounds. And out of bounds is kind of a release valve and you see it in baseball and you see it in basketball and you say, well, in contact sports like football, there's an out of bounds and the action happens seven seconds

at a time. There's no continuous flow. And that leads into emotions getting raised and there's no release valves during the play and the presence of boards. And Tia, as you mentioned, a velocity by way of skating and weaponization with sticks, et cetera, et cetera, you can make the point that there's an inevitability that this can lead up to. But we'll save that for another conversation because I want to talk to you about Austin Matthews. Mapley's facing off against Tampa Bay Lightning and then the Florida Panthers. Right now in Ottawa, there is a segment of Ottawa Senators fans that really aren't feeling it with Brady Kachuk. And you know, the reception from them is going to be frosty when Ottawa is at home tomorrow against the Detroit Red Wings.

what do you think Austin Matthews in for? I would hope. I mean, we talked about this on Leif's Morning and Take this morning, you know, about the, I mean, where do you want to go with it? About the reception to him. There's a few things. There's, A, he is American and he's coming back to the biggest Canadian market in hockey, and he's got the gold medal.

So there's kind of like a boo aspect to that. It's still fresh in people's minds. Most of Leif's fans are probably hockey Canada fans. and we're not happy to see them lose the gold medal. And then there's this new added level of him going to the White House and that being so bad. And literally the insane people online saying he's not my captain anymore, trade him immediately.

And that's social media for you. But I would hope that if you're really a Leafs fan and you're not a lunatic, you would say, hey, it stings that Canada lost. But my captain, who has a history of coming up, you could say short in the big games. His playoff performance is not like his regular season performance. The laundry list of playoff heartbreaks for the Maple Leafs during his tenure is very long. And hey, at least on the positive side of things, our captain just got a taste of getting the job done,

of winning the big one, of being victorious and being a champion. And hopefully that translates to his play with the Toronto Maple Leafs. And if they do a little video tribute, I hope people even, if they're Canadian hockey fans, clap and say, all right, Ozzie, hopefully that got you some confidence and some experience and some knowledge around leadership and winning. So here's the thing about Matthews that I, that I'm kind of surprised about and has nothing to do with him. But you have the son of a Mexican immigrant captaining the USA hockey team to gold.

That should be a massive story. That should be an incredibly massive story. Just his bio that, you know, Mama's Mexican immigrated to the United States and her son, captain the U.S. team to hockey gold. I'll tell you, man, when you were a kid, when I was a kid, if I would have told you that that was going to be the reality one day, I would have said not a chance. There's no way this is going to happen.

But here it is. And Jay, it's not a story for some reason. I'm honestly, I'm stunned. I'm stunned. And that's fantastic. And that's... I think it is great. But there's not...

Should this... Am I missing something? This should be a massive story. I like that it's not a story. He's an American. His parents came over legally and everyone you go down the line has come from immigration in this country. 100%. I'm saying it's a great story.

I'm saying like this is a feel good, awesome, like from an unexpected. Like listen, if, sorry, Winnipeg Jets, but like if the Jets don't go to Arizona, Austin Matthews ain't a hockey player. Yeah. You know? And that's, you know, I played with guys that are from California. And they were of the age where it went hand in hand with Gretzky getting traded to L.A. and the Mighty Duck series becoming popular,

and it's the only reason they're playing hockey and they're NHL players. And it's fantastic. And the fact that the caveat on Austin Matthews' background, having immigrated from Mexico and then picking up the game of hockey in the desert and becoming as good as he is, I think that's fantastic. And yeah, maybe it would be more of a story. I just think that the political climate right now regarding immigration,

Trump, the White House, America, and everything that's going on the last couple of days, I just, it drives me nuts because I just wish it was about the hockey. I wish that people weren't so divided and polarized and they didn't have completely differing opinions. And in my mind, it's all because of your algorithm.

It's all because of your algorithm. The people on both sides of the spectrum politically, they only see, they just get inundated with these stories and these ideas that are completely one-sided. and they literally don't even see the other side. And these people are like they're living on different planets because they only see one thing 24-7.

And it creates this division that everybody has to the point where the guy goes and shakes the president's hand after winning a gold medal. That's what athletes have done for a long time. It's you go to the White House where whoever the president is, you shake their hand. And it's an incredible experience that you only get to do if you do something and accomplish something for your country.

That's fantastic. And I just wish that that was just the story. Like it wouldn't matter if it was Kamala or Biden or Obama or Bush or Clinton. You go there because you won a gold medal and you shake the hand. And that's all that matters to me. And I mean, I just like it when the political stories are kind of left out of sports. That's where people go to get reprieve from all that stuff, which is so hard to escape these days. But back to your point, yeah, it could have been a better story saying, hey, look where this guy came from.

Look at his background. It is not a traditional story. And it's totally unique and it's impressive. And yeah, you're right. It could be a bit better story. But I've always liked that it's just like it's, it's, you don't blend the two, especially now. And you can see why over the last couple of days. I just think it's a victory lap for NHL Southern expansion.

And for that and for that for that Southern plan and a lot of it, of course, kicked off by the, by the, the Grescue trade to Los Angeles, which, you know, begat, you know, whether it was, you know, Florida and Anaheim coming at the same time, Tampa, Dallas coming moving, and then Minnesota moving to. Dallas, like all of it and how it all came together. I just think that it's an incredible success story. And, you know, maybe another reason why, for those that poo-poo hockey in the desert and hockey in Arizona, you know the NHL is committed to going back. Matthew Nyes is another example, not just Austin Matthews, but other players come.

I remember Louis DeBrusk when he was playing like Jake played, Jake played on a line with Austin Matthews and Claude Lemieux. kid. Now, the team had no depth, but like that line, like Louis de Brasque, Claude Lemieux, and, um, and, and Austin, Clod Demus kid and Austin Matthews was like the top line, uh, for this one team, uh, out of Arizona. But okay, nonetheless, uh, what do you expect, what do you expect Toronto to do here? Not necessarily on the ice, but off it. Because I think that's where a lot of the questions are, you know, you're, you're, you're

living here and you're thinking, I don't know, do you leave it for? for a couple of days here before you make up your mind, what happens against the bolts, what happens against the cats, then we'll have a better idea of our team here in advance of next Friday. Or if you're Brad for a living, you already know what this team is. You've had a look under the hood now for the majority of the season.

You know what you have, right? Yeah, it's a really interesting time. Six games left till the deadline. I mean, it's weird because I feel like this year more than ever, because of what's happened this season, there's this split between, A, there's a split between sell and buy or make a run or something and how the next two or three games is going to change that big decision,

blows my mind. But there's also this other caveat where is MLSC on board with what's best for the Leafs long term? Or are they, like, I know that the higher you go up in MLSE, the more the dollars and cents are raised supreme. You got this massive, you got this massive TV deal. And what that organization generates

with even one playoff round is massive. And for it to be the best thing for the team long term to get some assets back because they are so depleted in that sense and you have opportunity to do that, whether it's Bobby McMahon or whoever, to not do it because they showed some flashes in the last three games after the Olympic break is insane to me.

And what I hope they do is get as many assets as they can at the deadline and still try to sneak into the playoffs. I mean, it's going to take Matthews or Nylander or Nize and Tavares and you're going to have to have somebody go insane. And you're going to have insane goal tending in order to sneak in and to do the numbers that you're going to need to get into the playoffs. If you lose Bobby McMahon and get a first rounder or if it's OEL and you get this load back, still you still trying to make the playoffs. It's going to be hard regardless. But I can't believe like it's sell or buy and forge forward and don't worry about down the road. Because I'm quite worried about down the road.

I am not loving where the team is at and where their assets and their draft picks and their prospects are at. It's really concerning for that reason. And I'm, I just, I'm totally, totally waiting with anticipation on what's actually going to happen. And MLSC, you know that Tree Living's an employee of them. How, how handcuffed is he going to be? Is he going to do what he wants to do? Is he going to do what the fans want to do? Or is it going to be MLSC calling the shots?

It makes me think of, it's a really good point, Jay, because it makes me think of when the Ontario teacher's pension on the Toronto Maple Leafs and John Ferguson, Jr., who, was a pinata for Toronto media because every year he would he would go for it even though it's probably the same thing would be for Toronto at that point to rebuild like they had gotten all they were going to get out of that team but the story there was at the end of every year Ferguson was told to submit two budgets one that accounted for playoff revenue and one that reflected what a rebuild would look like. Both were submitted, and of course the Ontario Teachers' Pension

was going to favor the one that had like a 5 to 7% return on investment, which also gave the team president that covered to say, John Ferguson submitted this budget, and we approved it. The problem was there were actually two budgets that were submitted.

And the preferred one from Ferguson was rebuild. But the one that got approved was get to the playoffs. And I think that's the dynamic. You're nailing right there. There's the win on the ice, which is the Stanley Cup.

The higher up you go, the win is what's our return on investment? That's their Stanley Cup. And it's just unfortunate because a team that's as successful financially as the Toronto Maple Leafs and all they're looking for, all they're missing.

Like they sell out all the time. The jerseys are through the roof. You're out in the west and there's stickers and windows and license plates and jerseys and hats galore. That's just not the case for anyone else. They're worth billions and billions of dollars. So, you know, from like a kid's point of mind, you'd be like, well, the money's covered. They got lots of money. Now they just got to win.

And if they do win, it would just be loads of money and loads more fans and loads more merchandise and loads more everything. But they can't because it's big business. business and because the like you say the percentages regardless of how many billion you're talking about it's all about those percentages they're I'm worried they're not even willing to give up anything they're not willing to to give up a year or to sacrifice for the greater good in order to win and that's all the fans care about they don't give a rip about how much stock or money or valuation or any of that or the budgets they just want to win and they have so much money yet it's still evolves around money. And at this point in time, especially with the season they've had and the start of the season they've had, to not do what needs to be done right now to fill your cupboards a little bit and to try to rectify the wrongs that have made by going for it all the time, it's scary because you can only do that so long before you're left looking in the darkness

and in the cold going, wow, are we ever in a dire place right now? And then you're going to seriously lose some money. So I hope they're thinking long term. I hope they're thinking, you know, this can be done both ways. We have to protect the organization and the future and next year and all the rest of it. I just hope they're not so short-sighted to say, well, they just won two in a row. Let's fucking go for it. I'm terrified of that. Yeah. No, I know like this is. And again, I agree with you. You know, the entering the new TV contract, I'm pretty sure considering the billions, that's a B folks that was paid for this. They don't want to spend the first three years of it rebuilding.

And nobody expected this Nobody expected this season to happen, man. And it bothers me that everyone thinks that Marner, not everyone, but the Marner sympathizers are like, see? And they have a fair point of saying, see, you got rid of Marner and you went down the shitter. I don't, I don't subscribe to that. I think that the beginning of the season,

Matthews, the goaltending, the injuries, the guys they brought in, the depth. It's like, oh my goodness, it was just a calamity of errors. and I don't know if you were to start next season with the same team. I think that you could do better. I mean, we're a point behind the Oilers with a game in hand, and everyone talks every single day about the Oilers being Stanley Cup, you know, contenders, and they play in a division with Vancouver and Calgary and Anaheim and Seattle and L.A.

It's like, geez, it's hilarious, but it is what it is. I just, as much as ever, and it's weird considering the season they've had, I am very intrigued by this year's deadline. You and me both, brother. You and me both. And lightning as always, Jay, thanks as always for stopping my pal. You'd be good. Enjoy the rest of your day. You, Jeffrey.

Same to you, man.