Obviously Shanahan is not my choice for several reasons. The money of MLSE, the huge corporation behind that franchise, and despite good individual talent, and several coaches/gm's selected by a president-only (something many franchises do not have) the Leafs clearly wish to move on from Shanahan or New York would have been denied permission. Shanahan's had less success than Lamoriello who won more playoff series overall & in the Toronto bubble.
Obviously it's odd a franchise who can't pay it's radio broadcast would want or need a president-only which is a massive-expense for a team bleeding red ink. Lamoriello at 75 for seven years was a president/gm, who managed a team that played in three buildings, two pandemic seasons. Is Joannne Holewa, who's been with team since day one, and has drawn praise by every gm who ever worked here deciding to retire?
And in the hockey committee department of Charles Wang, do we want a president to hire his gm choice, or someone waiting for him hand-picked to say nothing of a head coach who a gm would want to pick himself? We have never had this here, and had Milbury in all three roles who was final person to date anywhere to where all three roles.
This president of hockey operations is a new thing in the NHL which only a handful of teams employ, and it's possible MLSE will eliminate the position entirely leaving Shanahan without a job, while a team like Columbus keeps going back to Davidson, who left, was fired by Knicks hockey, with the three-headed job eliminated but returned to Columbus to again lead a three headed setup as president. The Devils only have Tom Fitzgerald.
Lamoriello's been here seven years, outside of Steve Pellagrino from Devils, David Conte, Jacques Lemaire, most of the staff has remained since Snow's time along with Chris Lamoriello, who was hired by Snow.
I get people are anxious but it took all the way to the finals to hire Barry Trotz. Shanahan could be one of many still under consideration teams keep playing who could be the next interview as we see who advances among Carolina-Florida/Dallas-Edmonton. Long ago people left New York during cup wins to join other organizations. The season ended earlier back then, UFA was rare.
For now the waiting continues.
