With the Maple Leafs hours away from officially naming Dion Phaneuf the 18th captain in team history – and the first player to wear the ‘C’ since Mats Sundin left after the 2007-08 season – there are two questions that seem unanswerable: a) Is it the proper time to make such a move? And b) Is Phaneuf the right person for the role?

These are predictable and obvious concerns, but when you think about it, both questions are largely rhetorical. I mean, how does one determine the absolute perfect juncture to name a player captain of a sports team? And, what exactly is it that makes such an individual the optimum choice? If you line up 20 people and ask for their opinion, you might get 12 different responses. That’s why the Leafs are as justified to make the move now as they would be six months down the line… or nine months… or two years, for that matter.

A broad generalization would suggest that the perfect captain is a player who is widely respected – internally and beyond – as the leader of a winning team. And that’s the catch. Almost never is the captain of a losing team considered exemplary for the role. The best recent illustration of a player that endured the torment of failure to become a shining example of captaincy is Steve Yzerman. No hockey observer on the planet looked at Yzerman as a consummate leader after the Detroit Red Wings bombed in the playoffs against the Maple Leafs in 1993 and up-start San Jose in 1994. In fact, Yzerman and the Wings were considered a joke at the time; a gifted collection devoid of command, on and off the ice, that routinely folded when the stakes began to rise.

Ultimately, of course, it was determined the Red Wings needed a substantial up-grade in goal, and when Mike Vernon arrived on the scene – via trade with Calgary in June 1994 – Steve Yzerman began to evolve into a splendid captain. By the spring of 1997, after Yzerman raised the Stanley Cup for the first of three times, nary a dissenting word was spoken about the formerly chastised player. And, when Yzerman retired into club executive-ship after the 2005-06 season – having spent his entire 22-year career in Detroit – he was a consensus choice as one of the great hockey captains in history.

Such is the predestination that awaits Dion Phaneuf. It is his misfortune – though hardly of his doing – that he accepts the captaincy of the Maple Leafs in the midst of historic team failure. No person, ever, has been given the ‘C’ after five years of playoff absence in Toronto, so it’s difficult to pin a level of expectation on Phaneuf. The hockey club, of course, will not avail itself of whatever virtue Phaneuf possesses until general manager Brian Burke significantly upgrades the playing roster. Continued absenteeism from the Stanley Cup tournament will reflect unfavorably on Dion, as it would any person wearing the ‘C’. And that’s where the argument tends to lean toward those who suggest it is needless to coronate such a young, still-maturing player at this unresolved stage of team development.

The Leafs, however, quickly and clearly determined that Phaneuf provided a missing element not long after the mid-winter trade that brought him to this city.

It was only a year ago, let’s not forget, that Burke stood before a gaggle of reporters at the NHL draft in Montreal and claimed he could have easily moved up in the first round pecking order had he chosen to include Luke Schenn in a trade. “It’s not something I was going to do,” said the GM. “This is a player who will probably be captain of our hockey club in a couple of years.”

After a pre-season training exercise in Huntsville, Ont. last September, head coach Ron Wilson informed a media scrum that Tomas Kaberle, Francois Beauchemin and Mike Komisarek were being named alternates in the hope that one of the three might evolve into a captain “…maybe sometime in November.” But, with the Leafs sitting at a ghastly 3-11-6 on the 19th of that month, any such plan disappeared. After a blazing start, Kaberle tailed off dramatically; Beauchemin played big minutes on a bad defensive team, thereby accruing an abominable plus-minus figure, and Komisarek’s body wouldn’t allow him to stay on the ice for any length of time. With another season in ruins, there was no appetite to name the long-anticipated successor to Sundin.

The roster detonation of Jan. 31 changed everything. Or, so it seemed.

Though having run grossly out of favor in Calgary, Phaneuf came upon a timely change of scenery here and sensed his calling. After the trade deadline, he toiled on a club whose senior citizen – beyond Kaberle – was a Russian-born winger with less than two years service in the NHL [Nikolai Kulemin]. Long gone was the nucleus of a stale, underachieving roster. Perhaps in some way by default, the Leafs instantly evolved into Dion Phaneuf’s team. Not having to upstage long-serving veterans, the Calgary cast-off seized control of the dressing room, and oversaw a dramatic, though typical, late-season uprising by the hockey club.

Delighted by this turn of events, Burke and Wilson extolled the virtues of their new leader – maybe a tad over-zealously – though with a defined sense of purpose. In a blog last week, I reacted to a claim by Calgary Herald columnist, George Johnson, that the Flames had mistakenly pampered Phaneuf in his early years, thereby ruining any chance of the defenseman enjoying long-term success in Alberta. Having witnessed the Leafs take a similar approach, I suggested they, too, could be meandering down a perilous path.

Upon seeing the reaction of a couple of players [one of whom is still with the team] to Phaneuf’s continuous, resounding endorsement of Wilson – both impishly jabbing with forefinger at their open mouths – I stupidly wrote that “…the love-fest between Phaneuf and Wilson, late in the season, left others in the dressing room on the verge of nausea”. This was a blunt over-statement; vehemently unfair to Burke, Wilson and Phaneuf, and I admitted as much in a terse e-mail exchange with the GM.

In fact, any chance Phaneuf has of succeeding as captain – in concert with the requisite personnel boost – hinges greatly on the symmetry between player and coach. If this one is as genuine as it appears, the Leafs will profit from the relationship.

Dion Phaneuf’s time has therefore arrived – be it amid debate or agreement. He follows in the footsteps of men named Apps, Kennedy, Armstrong, Keon, Sittler, Clark, Gilmour and Sundin – all franchise legends… some bathed in team glory; others tinged by interminable discontent. The symbolic nature of the captaincy in Toronto is able to withstand the passage of time and the scourge of defeat.

Phaneuf has likely come to understand this.

The torch is his to re-kindle.

Reméljük fel tud nőni ezekhez az emberekhez, és olyan 10 év múlva majd őt is így fogjuk emlegetni.:rock:
Fél 9-kor mezbemutató és bejelentik, hogy Phaneuf az új C.