Where did everybody go?
Those might be the first words that come out of Phil Kessel's mouth the next time he walks into the Maple Leafs dressing room. This cannot be what he signed up for.
He obviously knew the Leafs were in a stage of rebuilding their core of forwards, but this might be the most extreme makeover he's ever been a part of—without the emotional "move that bus" chant at the end of it all.
And Leafs GM Brian Burke smiles a lot less than Ty Pennington.
Burke has been focusing almost exclusively on rebuilding the Leafs defense and goaltending this season, which has meant the rapid depletion of the forwards that the team started with. Not that it's a bad thing; it's just that for the time being—the final 20 games of the regular season—Kessel finds himself almost completely on his own when it comes to players who can score.
Since Jan. 31, when the Leafs made the trades that brought Dion Phaneuf and Jean-Sebastian Giguer ...
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Article written by Jon Neely