ÎÚÑ»´«Ã½

Rogers may be the most hated entity in Canada, as railways and banks once were on the Prairies, or phone monopolies in the old days. You get nothing but pain for being their customer. They keep you waiting on the line forever, their own people tell you to bring a snack or book, they send contractors who fix nothing, eventually you might get a vrai employee.

Masters of mediocrity, all they can do is acquire, which is their business model. Shaw, which I had at the cottage, was noticeably affable and competent, so it had to be bought up.

Then they unleash this morass on something like the Blue Jays, who had a human, fallible, emotional quality when Paul Beeston and Alex Anthopoulos were there. They were replaced by Mark Shapiro and his entourage, who’d flailed about in Cleveland until they were invited for a rerun here. They feigned some strategy and pretended to care, spent on facilities and upped revenues. They don’t manage the team, they manage fan and media expectations about it.

I don’t believe ÎÚÑ»´«Ã½ fans are idiots for sticking with their teams. What they want at minimum is to feel they aren’t being conned, that the team and its overseers really care. As Brendan Shanahan said: whatever the outcome, our players must be proud to be Leafs. That’s corny, dumb, heartfelt and childish. But without a touch of childhood, you rarely win in pro team sports or satisfy your fans.

It’s especially true in the era of free agency and moving on. I’d say Tampa’s joy over Tom Brady’s Super Bowl win there, or ÎÚÑ»´«Ã½â€™s for the Kawhi Leonard one-off, weren’t a lot more engaging than watching Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner grow, fail or endure as part of our ongoing local epic.

In honour of the Leafs deal, (Rogers’) Sportsnet’s Ron MacLean interviewed über owner Edward Rogers and his functionary, Tony Staffieri, who has the deep voice and demeanour Rogers lacks. Prompted by MacLean and with a palpable absence of emotion, Rogers said he was feeling great and his employees are thrilled. Staffieri repeated that in a low register, rumbling that they’re “focusedâ€� on “bringing winning teams to ÎÚÑ»´«Ã½ and the nation, frankly.â€�

I found his use of frankly — which, frankly, is always weird — especially so when dragging in the nation. Why the sudden candour? At the end of the brief, vacuous interview, MacLean had the relative cojones to suggest that money can’t serve as a basis for winning on the ice and asked Rogers to speak emotionally. Rogers’ trouble doing so was his most human moment. He then retreated to “public trust … responsibility� and, with a little tell of a laugh, “we want to win as much as our fans,� which they clearly don’t, based on the Jays.

Shortly after, it reverted to Staffieri, who said in an affectless voice, “we really are passionate about bringing championships to Canada.� This seems to be what management means at Rogers: repeat what the boss meant to say, sonorously. Alex Anthopoulos, we hardly knew ye.