This THN Archive story harkens back more than 35 years ago to a time in Maple Leafs history when then-GM Gerry McNamara and coach John Brophy went after one another in the media for the sorry state of the team.
We’re settling into our duty as curator of The Hockey News Archive – don’t forget, you can have full access to the archive when you subscribe to the magazine – and in today’s file, we’re going back more than 35 years to our coverage of a Canadian team in disarray.
No, not the Ottawa Senators, who were in the news for parting with their GM this week and forfeiting a first-round pick. Instead, we’re talking about the 1985 Toronto Maple Leafs, who fired GM Gerry McNamara on Feb. 7, 1988, amid a very public battle between McNamara and Buds coach John Brophy.
In this curated story – written by then-Associate Editor (and eventual editor in chief) Steve Dryden, as part of our Feb. 19, 1988 issue – THN examines exactly what went wrong for both the Leafs as an organization as well as McNamara, who held the GM position in Toronto for more than seven years, an eternity in the current NHL.
Neither McNamara nor Brophy holds back at all in providing their perspective on the end of McNamara’s reign as chief architect of the Leafs – or at least, the theory of McNamara being the chief architect. In practice, McNamara told Dryden, it was team owner Harold Ballard who decided who would be a Leafs player and who wasn’t, and who was good enough to be Leafs coach and who wasn’t.
“Unfortunately, I didn’t have the authority to pick a person to lead the players on the ice,” McNamara said, directly referencing Brophy and the coaching position, then discussing Brophy and his relationship with the Leafs coach. “Let’s say we didn’t see eye-to-eye.”
Brophy also spoke candidly about his working relationship with McNamara.
“Well, I don’t think we’ll be having dinner,” Brophy said sarcastically. “How could (we) be? He tried to fire me last year.”
Can you imagine the eruption from the hockey internet today if a coach and GM went after one another the way McNamara and Brophy did? Social media would be aflame with reaction to the outburst we saw with the Leafs three-and-a-half decades ago.
But wait, it gets even more unreal when we’re talking about McNamara in particular. He flat-out denied he was the reason for the sad state of the Leafs, who had won just once in 21 games leading up to McNamara’s dismissal.
“I refuse to take responsibility for what’s happened on the ice,” McNamara said. “I tried to guide (Brophy) a bit but unfortunately he didn’t listen.”
McNamara’s successor, Gord Stelick, lasted less than one-and-a-half years as Leafs GM, and the team suffered greatly until Cliff Fletcher took over in June of 1991. But as this THN feature hints at, Brophy was also on the hot seat – and while Toronto made the Stanley Cup playoffs in 1988 despite their terrible losing streak, Brophy could not lead them past the first round of the post-season, and he was fired in December of 1988. No one, it seemed, was safe from the axe from the infamous Ballard.
“Look, I don’t enjoy doing these things,” Ballard told the Toronto Sun after firing McNamara. “(B)ut in view of Gerry’s record, we had to do something. It’s a terrible record. In fact, it’s so bad I didn’t even want to mention it to him. That’s why we could no longer stand still.”
The Leafs never stood still under Ballard, but they didn’t win many games, and that’s the ultimate metric that Toronto could not thrive under. The Senators are in better hands under new owner Michael Andlauer, who already is notably more open than most NHL team owners, but he and former GM Pierre Dorion have nothing on McNamara and Brophy when it comes to volatile relationships.
Without further ado, here is that original story from 1988.
McNamara Takes The Fall
Vo. 41, Issue 21, Feb. 19, 1988
By Steve Dryden
TORONTO — Sunday, bloody Sunday.
Toronto Maple Leaf owner Harold Ballard levelled a shotgun Feb. 7 and fired…general manager Gerry McNamara, that is.
The move made for a messy Sunday in Hartford, where both McNamara and Whaler head coach Jack Evans were fired within hours of each other. (See page 24 for Evans story.)
Fed up with a team that had won just once in its last 21 games, Ballard dismissed the GM in a move surprisingly rife with controversy.
Not for what Ballard did, but for how he did it and what he didn’t do.
Rather than wait one day and meet with McNamara face to face, as promised, Ballard dismissed the GM during a long-distance phone call to Hartford where the Leafs were meeting the Whalers.
Many believe Ballard’s blast should have been double-barrelled. Second-year coach John Brophy survived, however, much to the disappointment of McNamara, who placed most of the blame for his downfall on the second-year coach.
“Unfortunately, I didn’t have the authority to pick a person to lead the players on the ice,” said McNamara, who replaced Punch Imlach as GM in November 1971.
McNamara, 54, tried to have Brophy fired last year, but was overruled by Ballard. He said that was the beginning of his troubles. McNamara wanted to fire Brophy again this year.
“Let’s say we didn’t see eye to eye,” said McNamara of his strained relationship with Brophy.
Proud of the players he brought to the Maple Leafs, McNamara said that he did his job— get the players. He indicated that Brophy hadn’t done his — get the most out of the players.
That is a viewpoint supported by some players on the team.
“I refuse to take responsibility for what’s happened on the ice,” said McNamara, who wondered why reporters were not grilling Brophy or asking the players what they think of their coach. “I tried to guide him (Brophy) a bit but unfortunately he didn’t listen.”
Brophy, who will oversee hockey matters while assistant general manager Gord Stellick and scout Dick Duff take care of administrative duties, did not meet with McNamara after the latter’s firing.
Nor did he plan to.
“Well, I don’t think we’ll be having dinner,” he said sarcastically after acknowledging the two were hardly on good terms.
“How could (we) be?” asked Brophy. “He tried to fire me last year.”
Brophy defended his record, pointing out that he took the team to the Norris Division finals last year. The coach said that whenever the team did well, McNamara considered it his team, and when it didn’t it was Brophy’s team.
Their hockey philosophies were incompatible. McNamara filled the team with finesse players who have not fit in well with Brophy’s fondness for tough two-way hockey.
McNamara blamed Brophy for not getting the most out of his players and Brophy blamed McNamara for not responding to obvious team shortcomings by trading some players.
“I asked him to move players and he wouldn’t,” said Brophy, who wondered what kind of a GM would attribute his troubles to his coach.
“I don’t duck responsibility,” said Brophy, who noted McNamara couldn’t make the same claim.
Ballard, who asked for McNamara’s resignation and then fired him when it wasn’t forthcoming, said the GM’s record doomed him.
“Look I don’t enjoy doing these things,” he told the Toronto Sun, “but in view of Gerry’s record we had to do something. It’s a terrible record. In fact, it’s so bad I didn’t even want to mention it to him. That’s why we could no longer stand still.”
Toronto was in last place overall, with a 1531-9 record at the time of McNamara’s departure.
The Leafs missed the playoffs three of the six seasons he was at the helm, set a modern-day club record for fewest points in a season (48 in 1984-85) and reached the Norris Division playoff finals twice.
The Leafs had earned just eight of a possible 42 points in their last 21 games before McNamara’s firing. The pathetic stretch lowered McNamara’s record since the start of the 1982-83 season (his first as full-fledged GM) to 146-258-51, a .377 winning percentage.
McNamara’s removal was an obvious triumph for Brophy in an ongoing struggle to curry favor with Ballard. But the 55-year-old coach expressed little satisfaction.
“The only relief for me,” said Brophy, “will be the night we make the playoffs.”
Thanks to the Minnesota North Stars’ dreadful season, that objective is still well within reach. After losing to Hartford 4-2 on the day of the firing, Brophy’s two-season mark stood at 47-74-15 (.400).
McNamara was subjected to almost daily ridicule by the Toronto media, criticism partly fueled by Ballard who often rebuked McNamara in print.
He was left twisting in the wind for more than a month while Ballard recovered from a heart attack in Florida. The owner often called Maple Leaf Gardens but reportedly never asked for McNamara.
Furthermore, McNamara said he felt betrayed by some of those within the Leaf organization, although he would not identify those he considered working against him.
Somewhat hamstrung by Ballard’s meddlesome methods, McNamara could not operate the club entirely as he wished. Yet, he insisted that, for the most part, he succeeded in overcoming obstacles placed before him.
“The hurdles weren’t too great at all,” concluded McNamara. “I think I got over all of them—except the last one and I tripped and fell.”
The Hockey News Archive is a vault of 2,640 issues and more than 156,000 articles exclusively for subscribers, chronicling the complete history of The Hockey News from 1947 until today. Visit the archives at THN.com/archive and subscribe today at subscribe.thehockeynews.com