The Toronto Maple Leafs, after dropping a couple of highly winnable games to a couple of truly bad teams, the latest a 9-2 shellacking at the hands of the Nashville Predators, are a team in turmoil.
It seems that that turmoil may result in some significant changes to the current makeup of the roster.
The Maple Leaf's brain trust has been meeting recently and having serious discussions over what to do for the organization moving forward, according to a report from Eklund of Hockeybuzz.
I am told by a very good source that the Leafs are holding some huge "monumental" type meetings over the next 24-48 hours to come to a consensus.....a consensus that may require fixing the vote by changing some of the people involved.
Uh oh. That doesn't sound promising, especially not for head coach Randy Carlyle and/or general manager Dave Nonis.
With new president Brendan Shanahan taking the reins earlier this year, Nonis was already believed by some, including James Tanner of The Hockey Writers, to be a "lame duck" heading into the season.
Carlyle, on the other hand, signed a brand-spanking new contract extension during the summer that carries him through 2016-17. He's probably (maybe) safe.
But that doesn't mean that continued poor performances and a team seemingly unaffected by Carlyle's message won't change Shanahan's mind on how to proceed moving forward.
But the Leafs have something going for them. Something everyone else wants. They have defensive depth...the question is do they have the ability to take some very good offensive defenders and flip them for the kinds of players they really need?
Shanahan could leave things in the front office as-is, and instead focus on turning some of the young defensive talent they have - players like Jake Gardiner, whose name has consistently come up in trade rumors since the beginning of the season - into the strong scoring types they really need.
It remains to be seen what direction Shanahan will take, but it's clear that fans in Toronto are unhappy and something will most likely happen. It seems more and more like a matter of when and not "if."
