Bruins hater Mike Johnson drops asinine take about former captain

Mike Johnson parlayed a 661-game NHL career that included stops with the Toronto Maple Leafs, Tampa Bay Lightning, Phoenix Coyotes, Montreal Canadiens, and St. Louis Blues into a broadcasting career with TSN.

Johnson has been the color commentator for numerous NHL and IIHF broadcasts, but recently, he has been the primary commentator for the Maple Leafs' regional TSN broadcasts. Unsurprisingly, given his ties to so many Atlantic Division rivals, Johnson doesn't have too many good things to say about the Boston Bruins.

That continued on a recent NHL Network hit, where he dropped the take that two-time Stanley Cup Champion and 1000-point getter Brad Marchand doesn't have a place in the Hockey Hall of Fame. While criticizing the Bruins on the Maple Leafs broadcasts makes sense as the regional guy, taking such a bizarre stance about Marchand's Hall of Fame status is a bridge too far.

Winning two Stanley Cups, recording 1000 points, winning 2 World Junior Gold Medals, scoring the championship-winning goal in the 2016 World Cup, and playing an essential role on Canada's 4 Nations Face-Off team when many said he shouldn't have made it, isn't enough of a resume for Johnson. Neither was scoring two goals in the Game 7 clincher in 2011 or recording 20 points in 23 games for the Florida Panthers' run last postseason.

Instead, Johnson believes that players like Keith Tkachuk and Curtis Joseph should be in the Hall over Marchand. Tkachuk, whose trophy case includes one Maurice Richard Trophy and a silver medal with Team USA, and Joseph, who was a Vezina Trophy finalist on a couple of occasions, and had a front-row seat to Martin Brodeur winning him an Olympic Gold Medal in 2002. Coincidentally, both were also former teammates of the non-biased Mike Johnson.

Bruins hater Mike Johnson drops asinine take about former captain

Johnson finished his explanation by saying that today he wouldn't put Marchand in the Hall of Fame, but talk to him in three years and it'll be a yes. My question would be what else could Marchand possibly achieve to make him worthy in Johnson's eyes? An Olympic Gold Medal is one of the only things missing from the trophy case, which he might get a chance to win in a few months.

If Johnson was attempting to generate some clickbait from this take, it worked, but sometimes a biased take has to come under scrutiny. The good news is that his fans in Toronto will love the take after years of watching the man who doesn't belong in the Hall of Fame dominate their team in the postseason.