Babcock Releases Statement About Firing.

The Toronto Maple Leafs did what many fans were asking for and fired head coach Mike Babcock. There's of course some behind the scenes chatter that the players were asking for the same thing. Just a little while after President Brendan Shanahan released a statement, Babcock did the same. "Larry Tanenbaum talked me into going to Toronto. I would have never gone until I met Larry. He's one of the finest people I've ever met. Had an absolute riot and met another friend for life in Lou Lamoriello. I thought we did an amazing job taking a franchise from where it was to where we had 100 point seasons, we set franchise records if I'm not mistake, got into the playoffs. I'm disappointed, we didn't have the start to the year we wanted and that's on me. I want to thank the fans, I want to thank the media, I want to thank the city, it was spectacular, I loved every second of it. And I wish the new group nothing but success. Morgan Rielly has been here the whole time. I can't thank him enough. And all the players I got an opportunity to coach. It's been fantastic and I wish them nothing but success."Kind of interesting Babcock left Kyle Dubas out of his statement.