Morrison is working for a new NHL team for the first time in 23 years.
The Philadelphia Flyers added a familiar name from the Toronto Maple Leafs’ old hockey operations group on Wednesday, naming Dave Morrison an amateur scout as part of a broader set of staff changes for the 2026-27 season.
The hire is a modest one on the Flyers’ organizational chart. For Maple Leafs fans who have watched the last four months of front-office turnover, it is another reminder of how thoroughly general manager John Chayka has remade the department.
Morrison spent 22 seasons in Toronto, a run that began as an amateur scout in 2004 under John Ferguson Jr. and ended this summer as a senior advisor. Along the way he served as director of amateur scouting from 2006 to 2015, director of professional scouting from 2015 to 2018 and director of player personnel from 2018 to 2023 before sliding into the advisor role.
In early July, Chayka parted ways with Morrison, director of amateur scouting Mark Leach, assistant general manager Hayley Wickenheiser, assistant general manager Darryl Metcalf and a cluster of research-and-development and scouting staff. The club described the moves as part of an “ongoing evaluation of the organization.” Chayka’s statement did not name individuals, but it made the direction clear: the new regime wanted its own people evaluating players.
Morrison’s staying power had been unusual even by NHL standards. He outlasted six full-time general managers, Ferguson, Cliff Fletcher, Brian Burke, Dave Nonis, Lou Lamoriello, Kyle Dubas and Brad Treliving,.after arriving from a five-year amateur scouting stint with the Vancouver Canucks.
Toronto did not leave the amateur scouting chair empty for long. In late July the Leafs hired Dan Palango as director of amateur scouting and J.P. Perpich as director of U.S. amateur scouting, both coming from the Minnesota Wild and both with ties to new assistant general manager Judd Brackett. Jeremiah Crowe was brought in as director of player personnel, the job that had belonged to Morrison in his later years. Brad Rossen, a Chayka associate from the Arizona Coyotes days, arrived as vice president of research and development.
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