Scott Wheeler - On the Clock: Toronto Maple Leafs: Behind the Scenes with the Toronto Maple Leafs at the NHL Draft

For Madelyn Jane and Beaumont

Contents

Foreword by Steve Dangle

After a lifetime of following the draft from home, the 2014 NHL Draft in Philadelphia was the first one I ever attended in person. The two things I remember the most perfectly encapsulate what it feels like to be a Leafs fan.

The first was on Day 1. The Leafs had the eighth overall selection that year. After years of drafting for size, there was a real thirst for some skill. I, along with many Leafs fans, wanted either Nikolaj Ehlers or a young, flashy Swede by the name of William Nylander.

When the Vancouver Canucks picked Jake Virtanen at sixth overall, it meant the Leafs would be able to grab one of those two. When the Carolina Hurricanes selected Hadyn Fleury No. 7 it meant the Leafs could get whichever one of those two they wanted. I was elated! I was thrilled! I wasterrified. What if they go off the board? What if they draft some big guy who cant skate?

The Leafs put my fears to bed when they picked Nylander eighth overall. From that moment on, everything would go perfectly smooth for Willy and the Leafs. At least, thats what I hoped at the time. I wasnt thinking about constant trade rumours and I certainly wasnt thinking about a several-months-long contract holdout. Every draft is built on hope.

My second memory came on Day 2. If youve ever been to a draft, you know Day 2 is hangover day. What I mean by that is everybody is hungover. There are fewer people there than on Day 1 and the ones who are there are a lot quieter than they were the night before.

In front of the stage where more than 200 young players are drafted into the league each year, right where there was an NHL ice surface just weeks prior, the draft floor is littered with dozens of tables featuring NHL GMs, coaches, scouts, and a handful of executives kids running from table to table in a jersey thats at least two sizes too large for them.

During the fourth round of the draft, I got to hear those iconic words in person: We have a trade to announce.

When that happens, the building goes silent. Fans from all over the league are in attendance and each and every one of them thinks their team is about to make either the smartest or dumbest deal in franchise history.

Then it was announcedthe Toronto Maple Leafs have traded the 94 th selection in the draft to the St. Louis Blues along with defenceman Carl Gunnarsson in exchange for defenceman Roman Polak.

After several moments of complete silence, one fan bellowed deep from their diaphragm, Thats a horrible trade!

Absolutely every person in the building heard it, including every NHL executive on the draft floor, which included then Leafs general manager Dave Nonis.

Despite being completely different players, Nylander and Polak are kind of alike. Nylander has been polarizing with Leafs fans for being all skill and no work while Polak was seen as all work but no skill. Meanwhile, Polak was a key presence for the rebuilding Buds while Nylander has been a key piece coming out of said rebuild. Fans thought Nylander was a great pick and fans thought Nylander was a terrible pick. Fans thought Polak was a terrible pickup and fans thought Polak was a great pickup.

The point is, after the excitement of the draft, after every scribe has scribbled their last thought about some teenaged hockey player who could be the next big thing or the next big bust, the players must write their own story.

In the mid-2000s, I was completely jacked for a certain Leafs goalie prospect. Every time I watched him, nobody could beat him. From the moment I first saw him play, I knew I was watching someone special. I knew I was watching the Leafs future in net.

That goalie was Tuukka Rask.

Your team can do everything right, scout every game, do every interview, run every background check, and have the player of their dreams fall to them in the draft, just to trade them away before theyve even played their first game.

In November 2005, the Leafs traded tough guy Nathan Perrott to the Dallas Stars for a conditional sixth-round pick in 2006. The Leafs practically gave Perrott away. Who could have known the Leafs would use that pick on a man who would end up making an unlikely NHL All-Star appearance a decade later in 2016none other than fan phenomenon Leo Komarov.

You just never know.

Even when you know, you never know. I went to the 2016 draft in Buffalo. The Leafs had the first overall pick for the first time since 1985. Even though there was a 99.99 percent chance the Leafs were drafting Auston Matthews first overall, my lungs refused to breathe a full breath of air until Leafs assistant general manager Mark Hunter announced the pick for the entire hockey world to hear. Only then would it be real.

With this book, Scott Wheeler will take you through the ins and outs, the ups and downs, as well as the known and unknown of the NHL draft with the Leafs. After reading, youll have new reasons to hope, new reasons to dread, and every reason to think the National Hockey League is simultaneously being run by the smartest people on the planet and a bunch of confused golden retrievers just trying their best.

Now, allow Scott to take you on a journey behind the scenes with the Toronto Maple Leafs at the NHL draft.

Steve Dangle is a hockey YouTuber and the host of The Steve Dangle Podcast , known for his videos about the Maple Leafs. He is the author of This Team Is Ruining My Life (But I Love Them): How I Became a Professional Hockey Fan .

Introduction

I dont think I really understood what draft day meant to me until I was sitting on my couch in the East End of Toronto watching it play out in the NHL Networks studios in Secaucus, New Jersey, in October 2020. There was something about it that just felt off. Namely, we were in the middle of a pandemic. As I settled in, turned on the TV, rested my phone next to me, and began opening folders of notes on my laptop to prepare to writewhich, on draft day, is an exercise in trying to keep upI wasnt excited. The magic of the day, a day normally filled with it, felt distant.

In normal times, the week of the NHL draft is the biggest thrill of my year. I spend each preceding season travelling the hockey world to watch and learn about the sports best young players, telling their stories from rinks and hotel rooms, and dissecting the ins and outs of their games (the oddity of which is not lost on me). When Im not on the road, my days fill with video work, local junior and minor-pro games, and phone calls a lot of phone calls. I write hundreds of thousands of words on every new draft class (enough to fill several books like this one), each of them in anticipation of two days in June. A few of the kids stories always seem to leave a mark, too, so much so that by the time their big day arrives Im anxious to see where theyll landor whether theyll be picked at all.

Then it all culminates with the adrenaline rush of days that begin and end in the early morning in one of the NHLs cities.

When Im in it, I try not to take it for granted. I try to live in the moment. To latch on to the overwhelming relief that follows after I hit send on my final piece on that years draft class and alert my editor that its ready. To tell myself that my preparedness paid off. To be thankful that this is my job.

Other journalists will tell you about those same feelings when the team they cover wins the Stanley Cup and they were among those who got to put history into words. Im lucky enough to experience those feelings at the end of every year with my thing . The draft is my Stanley Cup.