It’s not overstated. It’s actually understated because people are waking up to how fucked this team is but the Leafs themselves are still stuck in this bullshit PR story about a retool.
I get it. The problem is, they won’t listen. They couldn’t care less about what the fans really think. Oh, sure, they’ll pay lip service as they always have. It’s about money, and nothing but. They need the TV revenue for Rogers Sportsnet. They probably took a whack, when the Leafs were spiraling towards the bottom. Their bottom line screamed, “fix this, we need the money!” Letting Berube go meant losing the equivalent of 2 playoff gates, for his paid out salary. The may get that back, if Berube ends up in Edmonton. In their minds, they make that up if the Leafs go to the playoffs and get swept. They lose huge if the Leafs suck again and miss the playoffs. Of course, a shiny new star player buys them some time and more eyes watching the team. It’s in their interest to just retool, use free agency and make some trades to stay in contention. Championships be damned, just keep the fanbase watching, no matter what. If you believe that they’re going to rebuild, you’d be sadly mistaken. Matts was brought in to be the face of the team, so Rogers and Pelly could hide behind the curtain, while pulling the strings.
That’s up to Chayka and Matthews. If Chayka decides, it’s full rebuild time, what is Pelley going to do? Fire him after just hiring him? And if he does fire him or block his ability to rebuild, the average fan revolts after the rumors leak that Pelley is holding the team back from something a lot of the fans actually want to happen.
Nothing increases franchise value (the thing they actually want, not year to year revenue) more than winning a Cup. The path to that Cup does not run through a bullshit re-tool.