It’s common when interviewing for a new job to be asked a question that can say a lot about who a person is and where he or she wants to be in the future: “Where do you see yourself in five years?”

A tough question, to be sure, but as the general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs, it’s a question Brian Burke probably has a lengthy answer for. He certainly has a vision of where he’d like to see his team in such time.

Whether he could form a reasonably realistic response out of it is another thing.

But there is no question that a GM has a plan for the future—that’s why they spend countless hours talking with scouts and others, who spend even more countless hours figuring out who would be best to draft in the upcoming year.

The future is bright when you plan for it now.

The difference for the Leafs from many other teams is that much of what their future holds is playing a full-time role on the team right now—especially up-front.

There’s no question about Phil Kessel and what he’s going to be worth to the club in the coming years—although many will question whether the trade that included two first-round picks was too much for just as long.

Although many players appearing in their first season in the league are older than Kessel, it is clear that they have some catching up to do if they’re going to crack the lineup next season.

Maybe the most NHL-ready-looking rookie for the Leafs thus far has been Tyler Bozak— who has been thrust into the starting center role on a line with Kessel, and he has done a respectable job. His face-off efficiency is on the rise every game—and Ron Wilson has been able to count on him to win key face-offs in both zones.

His speed is another aspect of his game that has been a pleasant surprise so far. With the 13 points in 21 games that he has tallied, there is no question that a spot on the roster next season is his for the taking—probably not as a first-line center, but one of the top three, for sure.

Another guy who has shown his impressive skill level while only appearing in 24 games this season is Viktor Stalberg. His minutes have been limited on some nights—when he is used on the fourth line—but there is no question that the Swede is one of the fastest skaters in the NHL, never mind just the Leafs.

He has become known for his quickness breaking in toward the net off the wing and has had no trouble crashing the net with determination in hopes of creating a chance.

With just three goals and five points, he hasn’t put up the type of numbers that a player of his kind would like to—but there is no doubting the potential he has shown if given more time to mature and grow as a forward in the NHL. He may have played his way into the lineup for next season as well, especially with his play of late.

Luca Caputi, the newest member of the team coming over in a trade with the Pittsburgh Penguins, has already shown his skill in just four games with the team. The hometown kid has shown he can play a gritty, in-your-face-type game while being a menace in front of the net. He’s only 21 years old, but he has a goal and an assist so far in blue and white.

It’s not only up-front that the team looks to have some potential brewing—because the arrival of defenseman Carl Gunnarsson to the Leafs lineup has been nothing but positive. Sure, he’s had his tough nights—as any rookie defender would—but the 23-year-old has been extremely confident and shown great poise while dealing with injury and the rigors of an NHL season.

As for the goaltending situation, Jonas Gustavsson has looked good of late, but the glaring aspect of his game that needs work is rebounding. There have been various occasions when his rebound control issues have cost the team a goal. If he can improve in that area—as well as his stick handling—it will only mean great things to come for the Leafs in the future.

Even though the playoffs are well out of reach at this point for a Leaf team that has had one of the most disappointing seasons in recent memory, there is no question that the young players getting a chance to play with the big club will only benefit from the experience.

Starting next season, it will be interesting to see how many of them—if not all—make the team and how they can contribute to a club that’s hopefully in a playoff race.

It’s a tough call to make right now, but by the looks of things so far, it will be a bright future in Toronto—unlike the disappointment from so many up-and-coming players in the past.

With these players and the additions of others, the NHL’s youngest team should be able to steadily improve. And when asked where the team will be in five years, Leaf fans should only reply with a smile in anticipation.

Although, they’re hoping it’s more like two.

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Twenty-one-year-old 6’3”, 200-pound Luca Caputi, born in Toronto, Ontario, will have his life-long dream realized tonight as he takes to the ice at the ACC for the first time wearing the blue and white. 

Caputi has mentioned to reporters while growing up in Toronto and playing with the Mississauga IceDogs, now the Niagara IceDogs that he had hopes of playing for the Maple Leafs, which is now reality.

Caputi was drafted in 2007 in the fourth round 111th overall by the Pittsburgh Penguins, though he was projected as a higher pick. In 2007 with Niagara he had his best year in junior, tallying 51 goals 60 assists for 111 points.

Having the opportunity to play for the team he grew up watching has got to be exhilarating, and his adrenaline-driven play I’m sure at this point has been encouraging for Leafs Nation. Tonight’s game against Boston will be another test for the youngest team in the league and another opportunity to vie for roster spots next year.

After taking a shoulder to the head from Pittsburgh’s Matt Cooke, Boston’s Marc Savard will not play in Toronto tonight and the time line for his return to the lineup is questionable. Savard’s absence from the lineup for Boston certainly benefits Toronto as he is always dangerous.

I will be at the game tonight and will be looking for a section of Caputi fans who I am sure have been hounding Luca for tickets since his trade. Perhaps I can get an interview from a family member and get some inside information for all the BR readers.

Toronto should try to continue the success they had against Ottawa in their shootout win and hopefully limit some of the mistakes that contributed to their loss in Philadelphia which was due to a short mental lapse late in the second period.

Caputi wearing No. 33 and the rest of young buds should be fired up for this one, as games between two of the original six teams, Toronto and Boston, have always been a war.

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I was born in Toronto in 1970 and the first glimpse I had of this game was on a Saturday night sometime during the winter of 1973.

At once I was mesmerized, and since I was quite a rambunctious child, I’m sure just my captivation by something that kept me still thrilled my mother immensely.

If I were to tell you I remembered which team we were playing or who any of the players on the ice were, I’d be lying.

But I knew I had found something special.  It was called hockey, and my city’s team was called the Maple Leafs.

I bled blue and white from then on.

They had won the Stanley Cup just a few years previous, though little did I know how long that drought would last.

I was young and had started playing the game, but I wasn’t allowed to stay up and watch the whole Leafs game.  I think I was five or six when I figured it out.

I had to watch it all, to the end.  There was no other option in my mind as my addiction to the sport grew, but how?

My first con: I asked my mother while watching the end of the first period, “Could I watch the whole game if I let you eat the rest of my dinner?”

Now don’t get me wrong, I was lucky there was always enough food on the table. But I had, at my young age, learned to put two and two together.  So with my love of hockey and my mother’s love of food, I made my play.

I think my mother let me watch the rest of the game just because of how funny my proposition was, and of course, I parlayed that one offering into a lifelong religious routine from that immediate point on.

In grade one, hockey cards were everywhere, before and after school in the hallways and at recess, playing knock-downs and topsy’s and trading them. They were only 25 cents a pack and you got 10 cards plus a stick of stale gum that was crunchy; it was great!

My grandmother Nellie Taylor would give me a dollar to buy hockey cards if I gave her a kiss, as most grandparents would back then.

I would run to the store to get those cards with that glossy picture, the team’s logo, the player’s name, and his number on the front. It had that little story about the player on the back, how long he’d been in the league, which way he shoots, the position he played, and his statistics from the past year.

Trading those hockey cards, playing the game, and watching those games, instilled in me a love for that game, one that if ever I’m old and senile and can remember only one thing, it will be hockey.

There was a player that came into the league in the late 70s by the name of Wayne Gretzky, The Great One.  He and a bunch of other young players grew and dominated together on the Edmonton Oilers.

Every year after which, while watching my Leafs, I hoped for a young team and I waited for a player to come up through the ranks and onto my team.

A young star that would develop into half the player that Gretzky was, but alas, it wasn’t to be.

Year after year, Toronto’s general managers would trade away the youth on the team for a veteran or a bag of pucks or something.

That player would go to another team, some would do well and some wouldn’t.  But the ones that did do well, I always wished were on my team still…my Leafs.

As I grew up, I began to understand and now continue to learn about the inner workings of the game.

I’ve heard many general managers over the years say they were going to build from youth.

The city gets frustrated, the pressure gets to them and they crack, making yet again the blunder of impatience.

Finally, Toronto’s GM Brian Burke has stuck with what he said he would do, and as God as my witness, I am more excited about watching this team as it grows than any other Toronto has put on the ice throughout my life.

These growing pains are going to hurt, but the average age of the roster that played on March 7, 2010 against Philadelphia was 26.2 years old, and was officially at that point the youngest team in the league.

My dream of seeing young skilled players gel and grow as a group into perhaps a dynasty now has sparks of hope.

I will bleed blue and white from many wounds over the next couple years, but that blood, I hope, won’t flow in vane anymore.

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The Toronto faithful haven’t had much to cheer about for 20 or so years now, and the hatred has grown in their hearts for divisional arch rivals such as Montreal, Buffalo, and Ottawa.

Do we hate them because they’ve had success? Yes!

Do we hate them because they continually finish higher than us in the standings each year? Yes!

Do we hate them because they’ve had good young prospects and we’ve had mostly barren cupboards or traded off our youth? Yes!

Do we hate them mostly because we hate our own product on the ice and our past brass and their decisions? I say yes!

But things are changing.

Sure Buffalo has Tyler Myers; Montreal has P.K. Subban; and Ottawa has Jared Cowan—all certainly good prospects.

But Toronto’s stables are certainly not empty anymore.

Nazem Kadri is the first prospect that comes to most minds when talking about the Leafs and he is an exciting player with no limit on what he can bring to the table.

After the 2009/10 WJC, Jerry D’Amigo’s name crossed people’s lips in Toronto as much as Kadri’s.

Toronto’s general manager Brian Burke has said he wants to build from youth, something Leafs Nation has been waiting to hear and see for sometime.

So far he is living up to his word.

Some fans of the blue and white are still wondering whether Burke made the right move giving up so much for young sniper Phil Kessel, but Burke is sticking to his guns saying, “I would still make that deal today.”

And truly there is no use crying over spilled milk.

I think Toronto fans should be happy they got the cookie that was going to be dunked in that milk.

Howard Berger of the Fan 590 said, “Mats Sundin was three times the player than Kessel will ever be.”

We’ll have to wait and see on that one and hopefully Kessel makes him eat his words!

Did Sundin contribute to winning a cup for Toronto? No.

Will Kessel? Good question.

Burke has picked up a number of young college players including Tyler Bozak, Viktor Stalberg, and Christian Hanson—all good acquisitions with bright futures.

He also picked up goalie Jonas Gustavsson, who was considered to be the best goalie outside of the NHL at the time.

As well, Burke scooped up J.S. Giguere a known mentor for young goalies along with prospect Keith Aulie while alleviating the team of Jason Blake and Vesa Toskala.

Good riddance!

In the biggest move this year, he picked up Dion Phaneuf, and Fredrick Sjostrom another move towards youth and talent.

Carl “Uzi” Gunnarsson has come through the ranks of the Leafs farm system and has shone at moments and will continue to develop into what looks like a great player.

At the trade deadline Burke dumped the underachieving overpaid forward Lee Stempniak, AHL goalie Joey MacDonald, perennial 20 goal scorer Alexei Ponikarovsky and a sixth round pick.

In return, after all was said and done the Leafs ended up with F Luca Caputi, D Chris Peluso, D Matt Jones and a fourth, fifth and two seventh-round picks.

Those late round picks have turned into players like sixth round 171st overall Pavel Datsyuk, and seventh round 210th overall pick Henrik Zetterberg, but those are truly rarities and a credit to Detroit’s scouting.

But it proves that it’s not impossible to find high caliber players late in the draft.

From the 2007/2008 roster, one player is left standing and that is Tomas Kaberle. He will most likely be moved during the draft to recover a 2010 first round pick albeit likely a late first rounder but a first none-the-less.

The house cleaning is pretty much done minus the previously mentioned Kaberle and perhaps a guy or two on the jammed backend.

This is now a whole different team, are they are a playoff-bound team or a Stanley cup contender—possibly a playoff team next year—but certainly not a cup contender, yet.

Leafs Nation can now focus its energy, not on the hatred of the other teams or of their own, but towards the future with hope and open-ended possibility.

For more Leaf and NHL talk, catch my B/R counterpart Mark “The Hard Hitter” Ritter and I while we talk hockey on “Get the Puck Out” hockey show at www.MorencySports.com every Saturday between 6-7pm EST and you can check out past shows at www.ustream.com just search “Get The Puck Out” Call in during the show and voice your opinion on the hottest topics in the NHL. 

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I’ll start off by confessing this is not really an article as much as it’s a thought that occurred to me that I simply could not answer for myself.

The question I asked myself after the 3:00 PM trade deadline had come and gone was: What exactly has or is Brian Burke doing as President and General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs to re-build, or for that matter mildly improve, this team/organization moving forward?

I have a few theories and suggestions but they all lead to the same destination which is ‘Nothingsville’.

So I was hoping the good readers of the The Bleacher Report would be kind enough to help me find my way through this maze of odd trades, the biggest being the sending of two first round picks for a player that has as many chins, NCAA free agent signings, wining and dining a Swedish netminder that looks to have parlayed a solid World Championship performance and astute marketing by his agent into a NHL contract.

Last time I checked the worst way to get yourself out of a hole was to continue digging.

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