Maple Leafs Fire Babcock; Stanley Cup Odds Have Fallen From +1200 to +1500 During Six-Game Skid

• The Toronto Maple Leafs fired head coach Mike Babcock on Wednesday
• The Leafs are mired in a six-game losing streak
• The Leafs average odds to win the 2020 Stanley Cup have fallen from +1200 to +1500 during this skid

Mike Babcock is no longer the head coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs. The man who was paid a record eight-year $50-million contract to coach the team in 2015 was fired on Wednesday.

The Leafs’ Stanley Cup chances are also in free fall. Toronto’s 2020 Stanley Cup odds plummeted from +1200 to +1500 during the Leafs’ current six-game losing skid. One sportsbook is even less optimistic than most sportsbooks, setting Toronto’s latest futures at +2000.

2020 Stanley Cup Odds

Odds taken November 20th.

The 9-10-4 Leafs are currently 10th in the Eastern Conference.

Leafs In Free Fall

In their fifth season under Babcock, the Leafs, who haven’t won a playoff series since 2004, looked no closer to being a contender. If anything, they appeared to be getting further away from contention.

Mike Babcock & King Clancy (1954-1956) are the only #Leafs coaches to lose 3 consecutive opening round playoff series.

— Sportsnet Stats (@SNstats) November 20, 2019

Toronto’s goals-against per game is 3.43. That’s 24th overall in the NHL. The team continues to exhibit an inability to play a tight defensive game. The Leafs are 27th on the penalty kill (73.1 percent) and 18th on the power play (17.6 percent).

Following A Successful Formula?

It used to be that firing a coach mid-season was akin to shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic. It didn’t do much good.

Sheldon Keefe is in as new coach of the @MapleLeafs

Give your thoughts below! 👇#Babcock | #NHL pic.twitter.com/ZEtNPNnMeZ

— Tim and Friends (@timandfriends) November 20, 2019

More recently, that’s not been the case. It’s almost a year to the day that the St. Louis Blues fired coach Mike Yeo (Nov. 19, 2018). His replacement, Craig Berube, led the Blues to the Stanley Cup title. In 2015-16, the Pittsburgh Penguins replaced Mike Johnson with Mike Sullivan in-season and won the Cup.

It’s Not All Babcock’s Fault

There’s an old axiom around sports that asks when does a GM know the right time to fire the coach? Before they figure it’s his fault, that’s when.

Leafs GM Kyle Dubas badly hamstrung the team by paying half of the club’s available $81.5 million salary cap to four players, all of them forwards – John Tavares, Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, and William Nylander.

Shanahan: "Our game is not really meeting our expectations. We’re mistake-prone on defence, the attention to details aren’t there. Even the explosive offence our team was known for has been missing for a while now." #Leafs

— Terry Koshan 🇺🇦 (@koshtorontosun) November 20, 2019

The Leafs don’t even have enough cap space to sign a capable NHL-caliber back-up goalie. On a team loaded with offense and far too easy to play against, two big offseason additions by Dubas – defenseman Tyson Barrie and forward Jason Spezza – didn’t address areas of need.

Are The Leafs Worth A Play?

Absolutely not. A coaching change won’t fix what ails this team. Toronto is the kind of club that fails in the postseason. The Leafs can’t defend and they are too soft.

November 20 has historically been a dark day for head coaches on Canadian NHL teams

Nov 20, 1995 Senators fire Rick Bowness
Nov 20, 2000 Canadiens fire Alain Vigneault
Nov 20, 2018 Oilers fire Todd McLellan
Nov 20, 2019 Leafs fire Mike Babcock

— Sportsnet Stats (@SNstats) November 20, 2019

Both Sullivan and Berube owned previous NHL head-coaching experience prior to their Cup success. Keefe has never worked on an NHL staff.

If you want to take a chance on a team at odds of +2000, the Carolina Hurricanes or Nashville Predators are much better bets.