Did Tim Leiweke sign his contract in ink? Or better yet can he conjure ink out of his fingertips by the power of thought?
No executive can be a saviour, but that’s the role the former president and chief executive officer at Anschutz Entertainment Group, who will be taking over all things MLSE on June 30, has taken on, whether he knows it or not.
His bonafides are bolstered by the 11 championships won by either the Los Angeles Lakers, LA Galaxy or Los Angeles Kings during his time running the most sprawling organization of its kind in sports.
But after Wednesday night’s made-in-Toronto debacle, he might be wondering exactly what he got himself into.
The Leafs, on the eve of the 46th anniversary of their last Stanley Cup win, celebrated their first post-season appearance in nine years by being out-played in nearly every facet by the Boston Bruins in a 4-1 loss.
“We self-destructed,” was Leafs head coach Randy Carlyle’s assessment.
Meanwhile the company’s soccer team, almost inexplicably, was routed 6-0 by the Montreal Impact, ending any hopes TFC had at advancing to the finals of the Canadian Club Championship.
Injuries were a factor, but even a 1-0 loss would have assured them of advancing to the only championship of any kind the team has ever won. When it comes to MLS play, TFC have never made the playoffs.
The Raptors didn’t play Wednesday, at least, but otherwise the picture is bleak if championships are the goal.
They don’t have a draft pick this year. They are projected to be over the luxury tax threshold — a situation usually reserved for playoff teams — and they finished three games behind the Milwaukee Bucks, whose reward for making the playoffs with a 38-44 record was losing four straight to the Miami Heat, with an average margin of defeat of 15 points.
In other words the Raptors finished well behind a team that made the playoffs with a sub-.500 record and was slaughtered like a lamb once there.
Raptors president and general manager — for now — Bryan Colangelo says the team is ready to make the playoffs, but bars don’t get much lower than that.
And just for good measure the Toronto Blue Jays were drilled 10-1 Wednesday night. After the first month of the season, the pre-season favourites to win the World Series are last in their division, nine and a half games out.
The baseball team is one of the few things in Toronto MLSE doesn’t own (though it’s owned by MLSE shareholder Rogers) but the Blue Jays drunken stumble out of the gate is proof of how pervasive the city-wide, franchise-wide hex Leiweke is trying to exorcise.
Not many cities get beat 20-2 in a single night. The way things have been going in Toronto, if MLSE gets in on the NFL as they desperately want to, chances are 20-2 will be the score on opening night at halftime, and no, the Toronto-whatevers won’t be leading.
So it will be curious to learn exactly what he understands about the challenges in front of him. He made no bones about his expectations last week when news of his hiring was confirmed.
“My question to (MLSE) was: what can we do to achieve greatness?” Leiweke said last Friday. “These guys want to win and they have made it very clear they will give me the support, backing — anything we need to go after the trifecta.”
At this point it might be worth pointing out that Leiweke, who started off as an assistant general manager of an indoor soccer team and will now have run two of the largest sports and entertainment conglomerates in the world, describes himself as “the world’s greatest optimist.”
NBA commissioner David Stern has worked with Leiweke in various capacities for more than 20 years and described him in a New Yorker profile as “a sort of modern-day P. T. Barnum.”
Presumably he meant it in a good way, but time will tell exactly who the suckers are in this relationship as it emerges.
Perhaps it was the glow of the pending playoff appearance that had him excited, but Leiweke’s initial take on the MLSE’s major properties was that most of his focus will be on the Raptors and TFC, because the Leafs — the company’s cash-spewing diesel engine — were on the right track.
“I think everyone understands the Maple Leafs are headed for a long run as a good competitive team,” he said. “And I think about winning the Stanley Cup in Toronto and what it might mean to the sport, the city and the organization.”
There’s no doubt the Leafs have made strides, but it takes a Leiweke-calibre optimist to suggest they are poised for a ‘long run’ of anything.
Stanley Cup winners come in different shapes and forms, but they almost without fail feature a world-class No.1 centre and a Norris Trophy-calibre defenceman; superb depth and a goalie capable of being among the best in the sport for any given six-week stretch.
Arguably the Leafs are missing all of those elements and inarguably the biggest asset they have — deep lakes of money — is useless in acquiring them, thanks to the restrictive NHL salary cap.
Let’s presume for a moment that TFC can somehow be fixed, but aside from that, the challenges on the basketball side are even more grave if the goal is to be anything other than first-round fodder.
According to sources close to MLSE, Leiweke is very sincere in his pursuit of Phil Jackson to take on some kind of executive role with the Raptors.
This will be exceptionally expensive. If Jackson was earning $10 million to coach in Los Angeles where he lived and where his girlfriend was one of the team owners, it’s hard to imagine how big a Brinks truck will be required to have him attach his name and resume to the Raptors.
And then the question becomes: what does he possibly get you?
No one knows better than Jackson what it takes to win in the NBA. Of his 11 championship teams, he never had less than two Hall-of-Fame players in his lineup at the same time; he often had three.
The next Hall-of-Fame quality basketball player to suit up with the Raptors will be the franchise’s first. Even if Jackson does get on board, it’s incomprehensible that one of the NBA’s elite players would come to Toronto just because Jackson’s got a business card with a title on it.
Leiweke may be equal parts huckster and unrepentant optimist, but if the goal is to win championships in Toronto at anything near the rate he collected rings in LA, he’ll need to add miracle worker to his resume.