Auston Matthews Must Die So That Canada Can Live

Toronto, it has to stop. You have no idea what powers you are meddling with here. The Canadian space time continuum hangs in the balance. The unseen gods who control the perilous peace that somehow reigns across our vast country are in peril of being swept aside. I'm talking about your happiness, your uncontrollable glee and self-satisfaction at having a functional hockey team with a bona fide superstar. For those sports fans who don't live in Canada's Sports Media Epicentre, the Maple Leafs sucking is as important to us as having that one person at the office who is worse at their job than we are. This is an intrinsic part of human nature; I believe it was Descartes who said, "Let the world be cruel and unjust, yet let there be one guy who can't figure out the photocopy machine, and I will endure."

Toronto has it all, except for one thing: a good hockey team. Known as The Morgue among NHL pundits, the ACC (and Maple Leaf Gardens before it) has been, with a few exceptions, a hockey mecca where you'd go to worship only if you were in need of spiritual humiliation. Oh there have been some good players over the years, but according to a recent Sportsnet Insider's poll, the top three Leaf's of all time are Keon, Apps, and Connacher. Can anyone tell me their first names? ANYONE? These are apparently the Greatest Leafs of All Time, and no one in Toronto, much less the rest of Canada even knows their FIRST NAMES. And it's sweet, sweet tonic. The magnificent string of mediocre to horrible Leafs teams that began before the first moon landing and has continued unabated is what helps us sleep at night. We ragged serfs, toiling in the obscurity of un-world-famous cities, are able to close our eyes and shake off the chagrin that comes with a sad life bereft of Big City Living, because where it counts, (our nation's pastime), Toronto sucks. READ MORE: The Bullshitter's Guide to the NHL But alas, that is no more. Like Elvis Stojko, who ludzed into Ontarian hearts with the world's first ever quadruple double, Auston Matthews and his four-goal NHL record has sounded the end of Canadian unity. With Mitch Marner and William Nylander, the Leafs are a few defensemen and a goalie away from Stanley Cup glory, and with it our nation's ability to reconcile itself with Torontopolis City. For, if the Rest of Canada has no single point to rally around, no common enemy upon which we can levee our personal disappointments and regrets, we are destined to turn upon ourselves, which, as history has shown us, leads to chaos. I predict that the closer Toronto gets to the Stanley Cup Finals, the closer our country will come to splintering, then finally breaking off into the sea in fragments, like a snowball dropped into a bathtub. Oh you can chase after the pieces, but they'll just melt in your fingers. But it's not too late. For the love of our country, Shanahan, I'm begging you, do as your predecessors have done and commit some heinous trade that sets the franchise back another decade. Give a monster contract to an unworthy aging-talent who cripples your salary cap. Replace the coaching staff with dead raccoon, pizza rat, and IKEA monkey. Something, anything to stop this team's terrifying upward spiral. This country's fragile unity is counting on you. Follow Paul Spence on Twitter.