Phaneuf Is Off…To Ottawa
Sound all the alarms! This is not a drill! The biggest trade of the season has just occurred.
The Toronto Maple Leafs traded their captain, Dion Phaneuf, to the Ottawa Senators Tuesday morning in a nine-player exchange.
Along with Phaneuf, Ottawa acquired RW Matt Frattin, C/RW Casey Bailey, C Ryan Rupert, D Cody Donaghey. Toronto received D Jared Cowen, LW Milan Michalek, LW Colin Greening, RW Tobias Lindberg, and a second-round pick in the 2017 draft.
Phaneuf has scored three goals and 24 points in 51 games this season. The 30-year-old defender was the ninth overall pick in 2003 for the Calgary Flames. He, however, did not start his rookie season until the 2005-06 season due to the lockout.
After being traded to the Leafs in 2010, he became a staple to that team. Within 4 months, he was named the captain. He became the face of the Leafs, but that was not enough to keep him.
Over the past season or two, Toronto has been trading players left and right. They are building a brand new team by adding at least 17 players since 2013. Which makes sense since they’ve been a little too comfortable at the bottom of the conference. The players aren’t the only ones packing their bags. Just within 2015, there were three coaching changes, ending with former Red Wings coach, Mike Babcock.
Acquiring new players and coaches is not Toronto’s problem, it’s their lack of structure. The front office and management cannot read their players. They seem to not understand which players work better together. So, if two players lack chemistry, their first reaction is to trade one of them instead of changing up the lines. It could be argued that the Leafs are acquiring a younger team for future seasons, but you would be wrong. Currently, there are only 10 players under the age of 25.
Toronto may be trying to mold a team full of champions, however, Ottawa came out the winner in this trade. Phaneuf may not have been the best player on the team, but he brought heart. He kept the players spirit and drive up, even if they had a bad record or two during the seasons. Now that they gave Phaneuf away to their bitter rivals, the Leafs have possibly created one of the best blue line pairings in the Eastern Conference. All signs point to Phaneuf and Erik Karlsson having fantastic chemistry.
As the first major trade of February, there’s no telling what we can expect before the trade deadline.
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