This evening, the Leafs announced that they will hold their season-ending media availability tomorrow morning at 9:00am ET. That, along with exit interviews and players cleaning out their stalls will officially signal the end of another disappointing playoff run.
There have been lots of questions about the fate of Kyle Dubas, whose contract is up on June 30th. Dubas is sure to answer many of them tomorrow as he is slated to be a participant in the media availability. Most wouldn't think twice about him being present for the media for the season-ending presser, but having him present is actually a good sign. If you don't remember, when the Calgary Flames' season ended after missing the playoffs, the Flames didn't even let Brad Treliving speak to the media before firing him.
The fact the Leafs are having Dubas present during the availability bodes well for an extension. As Elliotte Friedman mentioned during last night's Seattle and Dallas game, he believes there have already been discussions with Dubas about an extension. It's something the Leafs want to figure out sooner than later as they need to have the new regime, if any, in place to handle the draft and Auston Matthews' future.
One of the rumoured sticking points in the negotiations is that Dubas reportedly wants full autonomy over roster and personnel decisions. This would indicate that, during this recent 5-year contract, Dubas did not have the ability to make all of the moves he wanted to make and needed clearance from the higher-ups. This would mean that the team he assembled this season wasn't truly his team and that he was still being controlled from above. We'll see what happens here, but things look to be trending in the right direction, despite a report from Howard Berger this weekend that Dubas and Shanny may be on the way out.
