Was just on a message board for another team I follow and a discussion came up where that team is severly lacking a go-to guy... an alpha male if you will. I started thinking about it, and just going over some of the teams from both sports (basketball and hockey) in my head and I really believe that this extends to our Leafs as well.
Quite simply, we are lacking that true character guy, that guy with the 'highest' rank on the team, the go-to guy on the ice, in the locker room, heck even in the media or community.
Now before nutman tells me it's someone like Grabovski or Kulemin, or someone else argues that it *should* be Phaneuf, at the end of the day, we don't have one. We did have one in Sundin. Prior to that Gilmour, Clark, etc. Now? Nope. The very fact that we can't instantly name one off the top of our head or that we will argue who might be goes to show us that we don't infact have one.
How problematic do you think this is? I think that beyond a #1 center, the biggest thing we lack is that #1 go-to guy. That true leader. I am not bashing Phaneuf or Grabs or Kessel or Schenn at all. They make fine complimentary guys. But none have the same aura as a Pronger, Toews, Chara, Crosby, Lidstrom, etc. etc.
Quite simply, we are lacking that true character guy, that guy with the 'highest' rank on the team, the go-to guy on the ice, in the locker room, heck even in the media or community.
Now before nutman tells me it's someone like Grabovski or Kulemin, or someone else argues that it *should* be Phaneuf, at the end of the day, we don't have one. We did have one in Sundin. Prior to that Gilmour, Clark, etc. Now? Nope. The very fact that we can't instantly name one off the top of our head or that we will argue who might be goes to show us that we don't infact have one.
How problematic do you think this is? I think that beyond a #1 center, the biggest thing we lack is that #1 go-to guy. That true leader. I am not bashing Phaneuf or Grabs or Kessel or Schenn at all. They make fine complimentary guys. But none have the same aura as a Pronger, Toews, Chara, Crosby, Lidstrom, etc. etc.