Clueless Ownership at Heart of Problem

<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">One of these days, Richard Peddie ? King Richard the Lyin' Hearted ? might be able to step back and determine exactly who the real problem is at Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment.

Hapless dupes such as Rob Babcock, who somehow kept his job until yesterday, will come and go and nothing will really change. Bad sports teams start with clueless ownership and that's what is in place here.

King Richard once again mentioned "accountability" and "stability" and it's crystal clear that the only stable element of the Toronto Raptors these past seven or eight years has been King Richard's presence.

On his watch, they keep hiring disastrous coaches, most of them kooks. Now they're again cranking up that GM search engine ? the one that exhausted all candidates and spit out the overmatched Babcock, who set the franchise back for years by drafting Rafael Araujo and trading Vince Carter for, so far, a bag of hammers. Ownership, meanwhile, has long since lost track of the big picture, which is easy to identify: 1) Stanley Cup and 2) NBA championship.

Nothing else matters. Not the condo units or the poker room or the soccer stadium ? hey soccer fans, you like this management team running another sport they don't understand? ? or the Marlies or the profit margins or getting their hands on Union Station (the next project) or any of it. MLSE's focus should be on two items and nothing else.

Peddie and the board of directors have done a marvelous job bleeding taxpayers and creating wealth where no more wealth is required by milking the logo, but are hopelessly falling behind on the main tasks. The Raptors are lousy and Leafs aren't even a playoff team this morning.

Now look how this decision shook down. A week ago, Peddie said, he got the board's permission to rinse Babcock who, under no circumstances, was going to be allowed anywhere near the next NBA draft. Then the disasters mounted: The team was embarrassed by Kobe Bryant's 81 points ? and it says here that no way will anyone ever score 82 against a Sam Mitchell-coached team ? then got skunked at home by Chicago in front of their tiniest crowd in history. Plus, the overburdened Chris Bosh looks exhausted and the first-year guys show signs of hitting the rookie wall.

Across the hall, the hockey team is on the verge of its longest losing streak in 10 years while Eugene Melnyk's Ottawa Senators keep sticking it right up MLSE's, uh, nose.

The fact that Mitchell survives, if not thrives, is another problem. Not because of his coaching abilities, which are sensationally erratic and often inexplicable, but because of the order of employment. It's true in any professional sport that the GM wants to hire his own coach. Once a GM takes a job, it's only a matter of time until the old reliable "philosophical differences" crop up with the existing guy.

Again, look across the hall. John Ferguson might (or might not) wish to replace Pat Quinn. The fact is, he can't any time soon. You can't dump the national team's coach two weeks before the Olympics. And if Quinn's team comes home with another gold, you can't rinse him two weeks after that, either. Even MLSE would understand how insane that would look.

So Ferguson's hands are tied (if he indeed wished to pull any triggers). And now Wayne Embry and King Richard and the rest are saying they want to keep Mitchell, whom they continually refer to as a "good young coach." So they're already starting the next GM, whoever it is, with tied hands.</div>

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