Dubas says he was "too honest" in final press conference with Leafs

Kyle Dubas might have moved on from the Toronto Maple Leafs pretty quickly, but it seems like he doesn’t entirely feel great about how his departure from the franchise went down.

Today, Dubas was introduced as the Pittsburgh Penguins’ new president of hockey operations, just 13 days out from when he was let go by the Leafs as their general manager.

While there have been all sorts of theories about why Dubas was ultimately let go from Toronto, Leafs president Brendan Shanahan admitted the decision to part ways with his general manager of the last five seasons was partially influenced by Dubas’ uncertainty about his future with the organization, when the former GM admitted that the 2022-23 season was particularly tough on his family.

“It will either be here, or it will be taking time to recalibrate on the season,” Dubas said at his end-of-season press conference on May 15. “You won’t see me next week popping up elsewhere, I can’t put [my family] through that.”

And though it wasn’t “next week” per se, Dubas’ mind was clearly changed over the last fortnight about his future in the NHL.

“Maybe I was too honest that day,” Dubas told the Pittsburgh media today. “But it’s in the past.”

Dubas confirmed reports that he had met with Penguins captain Sidney Crosby earlier this month at the Penguins’ facility to discuss the possibility of him joining the franchise, after spending his entire NHL career with Toronto since being hired as assistant GM in 2014.

Dubas added that after multiple conversations with his wife Shannon about the future of their family with children aged two and six, they decided there was no point in waiting for the next job opportunity to pop up.

“Shannon’s view was, if we’re gonna move, we should move now before the kids are too entrenched [in a city],” Dubas added. “You never know that if you pass on this, is an opportunity to work with these people and for a city like this and a group like this going to be available [in the future]? And so we jumped in today with both feet.”

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