I don't think it was a controversial move at all. The Globe and Mail
didn't mention the change at all.

No knock on Dorey. Here's the defence the Leafs started 1970-71 with:

Dorey, 23 years old, 107 NHL games.
Glennie, 24 years old, 52 games.
Ley, 22 years old, 86 games.
McKenny, 24 years old, 93 games.
Pelyk, 23 years old, 125 games.

There was also Brad Selwood, 22, who had yet to play in the NHL.

That's a decided experience gap. The lone veteran, Horton, had been
traded.

One of the things the Leafs sought from Plante when they acquired him
was to instruct the defence. It's no secret that he had strong ideas
about how he wanted his defencemen to play -- his style was rooted in
his own frustration with a weak defence corps's inability to get the
puck out of the defensive zone. The Star did make a comment about the
Leafs defence trying to "stickhandle" too much in game four, rather
than headmanning the puck.

I don't think it's any surprise that, after acquiring Plante and Baun
(who'd played more than 800 games), the Leafs went from ninth in
goals against to sixth in 1970-71 and '71-72 -- with totals
comparable to Boston and Montreal in those two seasons. These two
players made that young defence corps look good.

I don't note any explicit complaint about Dorey, but there were
comments that Baun was the only Leaf defenceman hitting anyone in the
series. Since Dorey's game was largely physical, perhaps he was being
damned indirectly.


On 8-Aug-08, at 5:14 AM, nybos1974 wrote:

> Thanks Lloyd, that explains a lot. The New York papers didn't delve
> into this much and it was hard to know if it was a controversial
> decision or not at the time. It may have been more controversial in
> Toronto, obviously.
>
> As for the defencemen, I thought Jim Dorey was playing well then and
> hadn't heard any complaints about him.

--
Lloyd Davis
Butterfield 8 Inc.
19 Tennis Crescent, #6
Toronto, ON M4K 1J4
416 462 0230
ldaviseditor@...
--