Dubas begins cleaning house in Pittsburgh, fires 3 executives; could he replace them with current Leafs execs?
Just one day after meeting with the media in Pittsburgh for the first time, ex-Leafs GM and current president of hockey ops for the Penguins, Kyle Dubas, has announced a trio of firings in director of hockey strategy Alec Schall, SVP of sports science/performance Teena Murray and director of pro scouting Kerry Huffman.
Why is this pertinent information for Leaf fans? Well, aside from the fact that, just over 2 weeks ago, Dubas was still our general manager, there are also some potential implications for the Leafs here as well, as Dubas could be looking to pry a few of "his guys" out of Toronto.
Three names that stand out to me in the Leafs' organization are Reid Mitchell (Director, Hockey and Scouting Operations), Dave Morrison (Director, Player Personnel) and Wes Clark (Director, Amateur Scouting / Assistant Director, Player Personnel). All 3 of these executives have extensive histories in Toronto, but all 3 were Dubas promotions.
The reason that those were the names I found interesting is because of the way Dubas ran the organization in Toronto. We know that Dubas has already stated that he plans to handle the GM job in Pittsburgh on an interim basis until some point in July when he plans to begin his search for a GM in Pittsburgh. We also know that Dubas had a number of assistant GMs in Toronto. Mitchell, Morrison and Clark were 3 people who he leaned on a lot in Toronto - aside from Brandon Pridham that is. While Pridham may not be interested in uprooting his life in Toronto for a lateral transfer, perhaps these 3 executives would be willing to depart for promotions to AGM in Pittsburgh, running different departments for Dubas while he handled the GM/President responsibilities.
After Dubas left Toronto, we heard a number of reports that several people in the Leafs' front office were "mourning" Dubas' departure from the organization. It would stand to reason that, as a result, there are probably a number of executives that might prefer to follow Dubas to Pittsburgh.
There might be other members of the Leafs' front office staff who might be targets for Dubas, but for the purposes of this piece, those are the 3 names who stood out to me, personally. It will be interested to see if any or all of them end up in Pittsburgh this summer.
