Gavin McKenna’s first steps with the Maple Leafs won’t be taken alone. Toronto has built him a support system that mirrors, in key ways, the path Sidney Crosby followed in Pittsburgh - with the same trainer in the room and a veteran star beside him.
That debut could still take a little time. McKenna’s status for the Prospect Showcase is uncertain, and fans may have to wait until the preseason to see him in game action for the first time in a Maple Leafs sweater. When that moment comes, it will be the first real look at what the 18-year-old can bring to Toronto.
The caution is obvious. The Leafs can’t throw him straight into the deep end and expect him to run the offence right away. He has the talent for it, but this is still an 18-year-old arriving in the NHL, and that kind of transition needs patience before responsibility.
What Toronto has done is give him the kind of developmental infrastructure that helped shape Crosby’s career.
The Maple Leafs brought in Crosby’s longtime trainer, Andy O’Brien, to lead their Sport Performance department. O’Brien has worked with Crosby since he was a teenager and spent six years as Pittsburgh’s Director of Sports Science and Performance, helping keep the Penguins captain productive at 39 years old.
They also hired Jason Martin as Head Strength and Conditioning Coach. Martin spent the last three years in Pittsburgh working with prospects, helping prepare younger players physically so they can handle the demands of the NHL season.
Between O’Brien’s kinesiology background and more than 25 years as a personal trainer and fitness and strength coach, and Martin’s work building younger bodies into NHL-ready, durable ones, the idea is simple: give McKenna a program that helps him become ready now and stay ready for years.
O’Brien’s staff is expected to work together, which means McKenna should always have people around him who are aligned on what’s best for his development. As he grows under the same voices, he’ll also learn more about what his body can handle - the same kind of long-term understanding that can help a player last as long as Crosby has.
Toronto has also given McKenna a veteran cushion in Auston Matthews.
Matthews, a former first overall pick and established star, can help settle McKenna in and take some of the glare off him if the spotlight gets too hot. Crosby had Mario Lemieux in that role in Pittsburgh, with the two even living together and giving Crosby constant access to advice and perspective.
The comparison isn’t that McKenna is Crosby and Matthews is Lemieux. It’s that both young stars had an older, accomplished presence there to help manage expectations. Lemieux and Crosby were both first overall picks, and Matthews can offer McKenna the same kind of reassurance in Toronto.
The two have already been in contact, and both Connor McDavid and Zach Hyman believe Matthews will be a strong mentor for McKenna.
There’s also the media side of it. Toronto brings a different level of attention, and Matthews can help McKenna learn how to handle cameras and stay composed in front of them.
McKenna will arrive with pressure, but he won’t have to shoulder it by himself.
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In 1996, the Maple Leafs found themselves in range of one of the most extraordinary free-agent swings in franchise history, with Wayne Gretzky open to coming to Toronto to be near his sick father. General manager Cliff Fletcher was interested, Gretzky was interested, and for a moment the idea of the Great One in blue and white felt more real than fanciful.
What stopped the move was the kind of off-ice decision that can echo for years around a franchise, with the clubs board of directors weighing the finances and the cost of the arena project before shutting it down. Gretzky instead landed elsewhere, and Toronto was left to wonder what might have been if one of hockeys defining names had ever taken the ice there. [Read more 🡒]
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Logan Stanley is the kind of defenseman that tends to split opinion quickly, and the Maple Leafs are again staring at a blue line question they know all too well. His size is obvious, and so is the appeal for a team that has sometimes looked for a little more edge on the back end, but Toronto has spent so much time building around speed and puck movement that any discussion of Stanley has to start there.
If the Leafs were to take a run at him, it would almost certainly have to be on a low-risk basis and with a limited role in mind. Even then, there is no guarantee Toronto decides the fit is worth it, which is part of what makes this feel like such a familiar debate for a club that keeps weighing physicality against the way it wants to play. [Read more 🡒]