If Auston Matthews does not maintain his 148-goal pace, this season is a failure

I am an ardent Toronto Maple Leafs fan.

I support them through thick and thin, and no matter their fortunes, that will not change.

But I tell you this: if Auston Matthews does not maintain his current 148-goal pace, this season is a complete and utter failure.

I should say his approximately 148-goal pace. I don't know exactly what pace he's on today, because I haven't had the heart to look since a few games ago, because to be a Leafs fan is to fear and to tremble when things are going well. There are so many ways he and they can disappoint me this season, and only one way they can please me.

I can sense your surprise. You think there are a lot of metrics by which the season could still be a success.

Not so, for a Leafs fan.

Say Matthews slows down a little bit but still breaks through the plateau of 60 goals, for example  — an extremely prodigious number, attained by only 20 men in the entire history of the National Hockey League — that would be tremendous, right? That would make us all feel good?

f he does so, it will only remind me that in just nine short years it will be an even 60 since our team garnered our last Stanley Cup in 1967.

And if he scores 93 goals, breaking the record of 92 set by Wayne Gretzky during the 1981–1982 NHL season?

That will only remind me of the failure of the Maple Leafs to capitalize on the MVP-level campaign in the 1992–1993 season by #93, Doug Gilmour, and failing to win the Stanley Cup that year.

For every number in our infinite world of digits, there is a corresponding Toronto Maple Leafs disappointment. Don't blame me. Blame them.

And hey, even if they do win the Stanley Cup: so what! I've gotten my hopes up here, and I demand that this one man keep them afloat for the next six months

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