It was a busy weekend in Leafland, between the draft, the Patrick Marleau trade, and the done-but-not-yet-official Kasperi Kapanen and Andreas Johnsson extensions. And Kyle’s work isn’t done yet by any stretch: he’s rumoured to be working the phones trying to add a defenceman, and his fraught negotiations with Mitch Marner are ongoing. Exciting times.

Kyle had another thing to attend to yesterday, though—the Toronto Pride Parade, accompanied by Morgan Rielly. Mo for Captain, if you ask me. Now, without further ado, I will hand the mic over to Annie for this next section.

The combination of rainbows and fashion (and rainbow fashion) has brought me (Annie) out of my temporary fashion post hiatus, because if there’s one thing that will get me to abandon a summer of gin and tonics and watching my baseball team lose, it was this photograph right here.

Kyle gets a lot of points for the color of his shorts—they pick up the small amount of red that’s visible in the rainbow Maple Leaf logo, plus, that shade of reddish pink just feels very summery! Morgan’s light blue shorts are not what I, personally, would have chosen to go with a black T-shirt with a saturated rainbow logo, but he completely made up for it with his shoes.

Usually, when I attend Pride, I take fitting as many rainbows as possible on my body at one time as a personal challenge, and I’m thrilled to see Morgan Rielly picking up that standard. (The shoes, apparently, were a gift from a sponsor, and he intends to keep wearing them after Pride, because he is a man of discerning taste). The rainbow on the shoes is every bit as saturated as the one on his shirt, which keeps them coordinating as opposed to clashing. Matching rainbows is not necessarily as foolproof as it sounds! I do wish that the Leafs had gone with a different gradient for the T-shirts; it doesn’t show the full color spectrum very well and basically completely cuts off red and violet, and I think that the more classically Pride-flag-style rainbow logo they used as their Twitter icon is generally more attractive and more deliberate about what it’s trying to do. That’s a minor critique, all told.

Also: cool sunglasses, Mo. Happy Pride.

ICYMI

Maple Leafs 2019 Draft Summary by Elseldo. A survey of all of the Leafs’ picks in the draft, with links to our articles on each. I like this Nick Robertson kid, I tell ya.

Maple Leafs Trade Patrick Marleau to Carolina by Katya Knappe. The cost was painful but ultimately it had to be done.

Back to Excited Episode 66: Draft Day Recap by Arvind and Acting the Fulemin. We take a look at where the Leafs are now and what the next steps might be.

Stuff We Didn’t Write

Grading the Toronto Maple Leafs’ 2019 Draft Class by Corey Pronman.  Pronman gave the Leafs a C+, but it’s worth noting he doesn’t adjust for what picks the team had, and the Leafs were at a disadvantage there from not having a first. His overall impression is reasonably favourable. Lots of players with hockey sense.

Ranking Every Team’s Day 2 by Scott Wheeler. Our ex-editor has a high opinion of the Leafs’ picks, especially Mikko Kokkonen.

New Jersey Devils Traded A Package For PK Subban by John Fischer. And the package wasn’t even good! The Predators were clearly desperate to clear salary so they could throw a bunch of it at Matt Duchene and Roman Josi, but the return they got for a 1RD was pretty unimpressive.

Draft Grades (Twitter) by Emannuel Perry. It’s a thread where Manny rates the choices of each team against his model’s guess at who the best option was. Toronto got an A, which means his model is good. Ottawa got an F, which means his model is good and also hilarious.

Have a good Monday out there, y’all.