Fury. Confusion. Shock. Disappointment.
These are some of the sentiments resonating with the Maple Leafs right now following Kyle Dubas’s dismissal as general manager last week.
The Athletic reached out to several people who work for the Leafs this week. They were granted anonymity as the team would not allow them to speak to the media.
This story reflects her feelings at the moment and bespeaks a level of disillusionment that team president Brendan Shanahan and the next Leafs GM are finding hard to quench.
“I’m grieving right now,” said a person who worked in the Dubas front office during his time with the Leafs.
There is a real sense of loss among the employees. Dubas was their leader and the one who hired many of them. Suddenly he was gone a week after the season ended – and she had no satisfactory explanation as to why.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” a member of the Leafs’ front office said of the way Dubas was fired. “That’s why it’s disappointing.”
Shanahan wanted to get Dubas back and released him within days. And then, in a press conference, he presented his version of events that left people within the organization confused and upset.
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Jason Spezza resigned before this press conference even started. The popular former Leaf, who retired from a front office position after the 2021-22 season, has declined to look further into the matter. That was on purpose. Spezza wanted his actions to speak for themselves.
Reading between the lines, it’s obvious that he was unhappy with what was happening and was willing to sacrifice the beginnings of his own playing career for it.
Spezza worked for his hometown team. He had his family here. He had every reason to stay with the Leafs, where he could pursue his future in hockey, but left anyway to support his boss.
Kyle Dubas and Jason Spezza. (Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)
After a 19-year playing career in the NHL, during which he earned an estimated $90 million, according to CapFriendly, Spezza could afford to leave the club. Others who felt the same way and were inclined to follow their leader out the door could not, lacking the same sense of financial security.
It’s the security they have thanks to Dubas.
Despite not being offered an extension himself until after the contract period had expired, Dubas struggled to renew the staff who came in with expiring contracts last season. He renewed them with one-, two- and three-year contracts.
At least one employee was inclined to see through an uncertain year with Dubas. Dubas insisted: Take charge of security, protect your family.
“Don’t worry about me,” he said to his people. “I’ll be fine.”
Those close to Dubas insist they enjoyed working for him. Dubas put her first and had obviously grown into his leadership role.
It was early last season, with the team stumbling badly out of goal in October, when Dubas brought the entire Leafs division together for a get-together.
He calmed a tense group. “Give the best you can be,” he told everyone. “Just do what you do.”
The overall message: everything was fine. The team would be fine. And indeed, as of November 1, the Leafs ended with the second-best record in the league.
For at least one person working for the Leafs, last season felt like the first time everyone in the organization pulled together. Of course, it was about their common mission to win the Stanley Cup.
But it was also about Dubas. Everyone knew he was in the final year of his contract. And while Dubas seemed the same on the outside and was treating the job the same as before, they knew as well as he did that his job was literally on the line (even if they assumed he would come back after the Leafs’ first-round win against Tampa).
Many in the organization had worked with Dubas before he became GM of the Leafs as he toiled under then-GM Lou Lamoriello and led the Marlies to the 2018 Calder Cup. Over the past five years, they’ve seen firsthand how he builds the leaves into a finely tuned, sprawling machine that strives to maximize everything possible in the organization.
“People don’t understand how much work he put in,” the Leafs front office member said. “You made it with this guy.”
This explains why Dubas appears to have come to the top of the Penguins’ GM search this week.
It was Dubas, then assistant GM of Lamoriello, who oversaw the induction of Jeremy Bettle and the establishment of a sports science department. It was Dubas who, with support from head coach Sheldon Keefe, oversaw the expansion of a skills development program that allowed players to hone their skills throughout the season.
Auston Matthews and John Tavares in particular raved about the operation. Players like Conor Timmins spent mornings with ice skating coach Paul Matheson, while skill development consultants like Denver Manderson accompanied the skill training team along the way. The Leafs even took their practice goaltender Andrew D’Agostini on road trips, even long ones, to spare their first-choice goalies some wear and tear.
That didn’t exist before Dubas. There was no “process,” an organization-wide approach that reached from the top to every corner of the organization. In the Lamoriello days, information was more isolated. This changed after Dubas became GM. Employees from the research and development departments regularly visited the practice. The dress code was relaxed. Players and coaches had the freedom to wear facial hair and felt more comfortable being themselves.
They saw Dubas pour everything he had into the organization. They saw that he watched as much or even more videos than many of his own scouts. That he’s solicited connections and information from people in other sports and businesses to advance the Leafs.
Staff were encouraged to do the same.
That’s why the way Dubas was fired was so disturbing to her. They believe it wasn’t about money or power for Dubas and were skeptical that he would insist on last-minute changes. That wasn’t the way Dubas did business.
If he had insisted on changes in the chain of command, as Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman reported, it would be in her estimation to be more efficient and effective. As for the family worries Dubas alluded to in his end-of-season press conference, it’s believed he just wanted to take a break, look inside, and figure out how to make things work better for himself, his family, and the Leafs .
There is disbelief in the organization that Shanahan would be willing to change course from someone who has grown so much over the years, who is so dedicated to the Leafs and who, as Shanahan himself says, performed well last season has rendered.
It was “inconceivable” to the Leafs staff that it would end like this.
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And now some employees are wondering: How will the Leafs find someone better? Someone willing to implement a series of franchise-changing decisions in a matter of weeks? Someone who promotes a similar work culture. And what does that mean for the Leafs?
Shanahan’s explanation only caused more confusion and anger among the staff that Dubas would be vilified in this way, with strange negotiations and the conclusion that more money was insisted on at the last minute, upon departure. It annoyed her that Dubas was portrayed that way.
He deserved better, they said.
Dubas is also not the type to defend himself, one of the staff said, so these proposals would not be defended.
And in fact, in his only public commentsDubas has declined to go into details.
(Top Photo: Lance McMillan/Toronto Star via Getty Images)