'The Slant Is Incorrect' Brad Treliving Pushed Back On Criticism That The Maple Leafs Have Scaled Back How It Deals With Injuries

Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brad Treliving is rejecting the notion that his club has regressed in terms of how it assesses injuries.

Treliving was a guest on TSN's OverDrive show on Thursday afternoon, responding to an article published earlier in the morning in The Athletic that questioned the team's decision to eliminate a high-level sports science role formerly held by Rich Rottenberg last summer.

Treliving strongly denied that the team has scaled back its commitment to player health and cited the following:

Increased Personnel: He asserts that the team has actually increased staff size and the number of "player-facing" positions, such as therapists and strength and conditioning personnel, compared to last year.

Restructuring vs. Elimination: He clarifies that while a "director" title was changed to a "coordinator," the duties of overseeing the medical staff remain fulfilled and the process has not been compromised.

Budgeting: He notes that expenditures for player performance have increased since he became GM.

Treliving also surmised that the increased amount of injuries the Leafs have endured are a league-wide trend that has more to do with the condensed schedule, pointing out that nearly 100 more players were placed on injured reserve league-wide between October and January this year compared to last.

Treliving is not with the with team in Seattle, but is expected to join the club during the road trip that goes through Vancouver, Calgary and ends in Edmonton before the Olympics break.

Below it the full transcript of that part of the conversation:

Host: You know, Jonas Siegel wrote an article in The Athletic today. The title of it is, "Why did the Maple Leafs eliminate a job designed to keep players healthy?". He writes about how there used to be a couple of different guys who basically ran the sports science department for the Leafs. This past year, the most recent guy who was running it—his contract was up, he's moved on to Pittsburgh, and you guys have not refilled that role. I’d like you to respond to that. Where do you stand?

Brad Treliving: Yeah, and I get it. I understand the job sometimes is to dig into different areas of the organization. First and foremost, I’d say when we don't perform, we should take every bullet we deserve. But in this particular case, with this particular article, I just take issue with it. I stick up for our medical staff. I think the slant of the article is, quite frankly, completely incorrect.There was a gentleman here, Rich Rottenberg who was with the organization, left, and went on to Pittsburgh. He is a good man and did a good job, but his duties were basically a coordinated position. We promoted somebody into that position to oversee and coordinate the daily job description and duties of our medical staff. Quite frankly, we’ve added more staff this year than we had last year. The insinuation that we have cut back in any way, shape, or form in terms of the medical, the performance, or any of the care of our players is simply incorrect. It’s wrong. The gentleman quoted in the article is a previous staff member. I’ve been here two and a half years—going on my third. This individual, I’ve never met him. He hasn't been around to know the inner workings of our staff. I would put our medical team and the care our players get amongst the very best, not only in the NHL but in professional sports. We’ve added to our staff in terms of player-facing positions—the people that are touching the players and administering therapy to them. It’s something we take very seriously. If you asked any player that's come through Toronto, the care they get is second to none.When you look at the injuries, it’s a contact sport; you’re going to have them. But if you look at the numbers league-wide from October 1st to January 28th, you’ve got close to 100 more players on Injured Reserve this year than last year. I think it’s a result of a condensed schedule and more games being played in a shorter period. It has nothing to do with medical attention. The facts are: the medical care of our players will never be compromised. We’ve increased our staff, increased personnel, increased therapists, and increased our strength and conditioning program. Success on the ice—or lack thereof—is not an indication of the medical staff. I would push back on the idea that our process isn't conducive to keeping players healthy as hard as I possibly can.

Host: Has budgeting for something like this changed at all over the last 18-24 months  since Keith Pelly (MLSE CEO) arrived in terms of you know everything we're talking about the all-encompassing you know treatment of players do you have the same amount of money today to do whatever you'd like with it that you would have a year or two ago?

Brad Treliving: It's increased since I've been here so the the actual expenditure in terms of what we put into player performance the individuals the staff size has increased the expenditures increased so that is never an issue in terms of what we need. I look at our sports performance staff as our goal is to be as on the cutting edge of of whatever new and innovative technology is out there and like i said the fact of the matter is we've increased personnel we've increased therapists we've increased our strength and conditioning personnel and program the success on the ice is not any or the lack thereof that we've had so far this year is not an indication anything to do with the medical staff nor is it you know I think the headline was you know the process that we're going or the process that we have right now isn't conducive to keeping players healthy.

Host: Dr. Jeremy Bettle is the name of the individual originally hired in 2015. He left in 2019. One of his arguments is that you need someone medically inclined to make a call if a strength coach and a therapist disagree. His argument is a GM or a coach can't do it. How does that work today?

Brad Treliving: I would agree. I don’t know Dr. Bettle, but that’s exactly how it works. No member of the coaching staff or management makes any decisions regarding players' health or return-to-play. We have a comprehensive process directed by our medical directors.

The position we had last year—where I think Jonas has gone down a rabbit hole—is in titles. We went from a "Sports Performance Director" to a "Sports Performance Coordinator". The coordinating part has not changed at all. We’ve increased the number of people actually working on the players. Looking ahead to this year’s increased schedule, we wanted more "hands-on" staff. This is not a step back; to me, this is as progressive an operation as I’ve seen.