TORONTO

Former Toronto Maple Leafs head coach Randy Carlyle opened the front door at his home on Wednesday afternoon to find a Toronto sports writer standing on his front porch.

“How did you find me?” Carlyle joked, after agreeing to talk for a few minutes.

During a 25-minute interview with the Toronto Sun, Carlyle was able to smile and joke, though there was a sense of real sadness in his voice. Carlyle said, yes, of course, being fired by the Leafs on Tuesday hurt like hell, but in comparison with everything else going on in his life lately, it’s nothing he can’t face with a smile.

The day after Leafs management pulled the trigger on his job, on Wednesday, Carlyle’s brother-in-law, John Stack, (the brother of Carlyle’s wife Corey) died of ALS in his home town of Sudbury. Stack, a former jail guard, had battled the disease for more than a year. Earlier this week, Carlyle had driven his wife and mother-in-law up to Sudbury and drove back down to Toronto early Wednesday morning to pick up his daughter Alexis.

"Well I'm going to go back up to Sudbury because I have the funeral which will be taking place over the next little while," Carlyle said.

“Just an awful disease,” added Carlyle, sitting at his kitchen table in his comfortable central Etobicoke home. “You’re just trapped inside the body. Your mind and everything is still there, but you’re just trapped.

“It was a year of hell,” Carlyle added. “This (losing my job) is so minute when you spend the time with your family and see the heartache that’s just gone on in their life and the hardships that are coming and the loss of a loved one and a family member. But that’s a reality of life. That’s life. My experiencing losing my job is minute.”

More than the passing of his brother-in-law and losing his job (after guiding the Leafs to a 21-16-3 record this season), Carlyle revealed that he also has to undergo back surgery later in this month and is dealing with some credit-card issues.

“Some of our credit cards have been compromised,” he said. “It happened over Christmas. But these things happen. This is life.”

The new year certainly has not been kind to the long-time NHL coach and player, although he had nothing negative to say about the Leafs or his former players, making the latter perfectly clear.

“I have a relationship with those people. It’s courteous, it’s professional. Do I like what happened? No. But that’s part of the business and now it’s time for me to just go low for a little bit in my life,” said Carlyle, who coached the Anaheim Ducks to a Stanley Cup in 2007.

“I’ve got some personal issues that are going on around me and my family. And that’s most important. I spent two days in an environment where losing my job is so minute.

“(Being fired) is part of the pro business,” he added. “We didn’t win enough. And, obviously, I don’t feel good about it. And I’m not looking at (management) and saying ‘Those rotten, effin’ ...’ whatever word you want to use. I’m looking at it and saying, ‘Hey, they made a decision.’

“I was fortunate enough to work for some great people. Larry Tanenbaum is a friend of mine, Dale Lastman is a friend of mine. I got to know George Cope a little bit. Shanny gave me an extra year on my contract.

“There are a lot of things I’m grateful for. I’m grateful to have the opportunity to coach here. I feel that I’m at peace with it and there’s a sense of relief.

“Hey, I’m going to the grocery store this afternoon and I don’t really care. I know the people at the grocery store. I know the people at the coffee shop. I know the people where I go. I’m not going to stop living. I’ll do what I have to do.”

Carlyle was asked if he had seen some of the heated interviews his former star forward Phil Kessel — the man many blame most for Carlyle’s firing — has gone through the last couple of days.

“Yeah, they have TVs in Sudbury,” he said with a laugh.

“But like I said, I’m not here to throw stones or throw mud at anybody. I appreciate the players for what they are, they’re the best athletes in my mind. Phil’s an elite athlete. Obviously, there’s deficiencies in us all. And that’s the way I’d like to leave it.”

Carlyle opened up about the final few days behind Toronto’s bench, saying that he had a sense he was going to be fired after Saturday’s 5-1 loss to the Jets in Winnipeg, the last of a seven-game road trip that saw the Leafs go 2-5.

“When I walked off the ice in Winnipeg, in my mind, I thought this could be my last game,” said Carlyle.

Two days later, he could see the axe was about to fall.

“I got a text from Noni (Nonis) on Monday night after the world junior game, and he said, ‘I want to meet you in the office tomorrow morning at 8 o’clock,’ ” said Carlyle. “He actually knew that I wouldn’t be able to make it. He knew where I was because I told him I needed to drive my mother-in-law and my wife to Sudbury. So he knew I was there and I was planning on making it back for practice the next morning (Tuesday).

“So there was a red flag automatically, a light went on in my mind ... well, if he wants to meet me at 8 o’clock, obviously it’s pretty important,” Carlyle continued. “So I just said, ‘Call me.’ And we had a conversation. And I said, ‘I’m not going to drive five hours back and through a snowstorm to get fired. You might as well do it now.’ ”

Which Nonis did. He fired Carlyle over the phone.

“But I don’t hold any ill will because it was over the phone,” said Carlyle. “I don’t. I just said, ‘If you’re going to make a change, Dave, let me know.’ ”

Given the direction the Leafs were going, Carlyle said he wasn’t surprised with the timing of the move.

“The disappointing thing is, we didn’t play to a high enough brand of hockey on a regular basis. We put ourselves in good positions. And to me there was no more tell-tale sign than the road trip when we had a 4-2 lead in Florida going into the third (a 6-4 loss on Dec.28). In Tampa the next day we had a 2-0 lead (and lost 3-2). Those are two games where those points should have been ours. And then we go into Boston and we have a two-goal lead there, and they tie it up and we win in a shootout (4-3). And then we go to Minnesota (Jan. 2) and we played as good a game as we’ve had (losing 3-1) all season. We played the right way. And then we got to Winnipeg, we had nothing in the tank.”

Carlyle said his emotions over losing his job after almost three years was more disappointment than bitterness or frustration. But he admitted that there have been some things about coaching in Toronto that have rubbed him the wrong way. For example, the media reports and the public expectation that Detroit Red Wings coach Mike Babcock is waiting in the wings to take over the Leafs’ head coaching gig next season bothered him.

“That’s not fun,” he said. “That’s not fun to deal with. I’d like for people to walk in your shoes sometimes when they’re talking about your (supposed) replacement.”

Interestingly, Carlyle said neither the media nor the passionate Leafs Nation fan base bothered him to any great extent during his time in T.O. He said he appreciates the passion in this town for the Leafs and is just disappointed he didn’t lead the club to playoff success.

“Yeah, they’re over the top,” said Carlyle about the fans and media. “I just think that’s the modern day, Internet world. It’s all part of it, it’s the passion. People can make comments with no face to it. So it makes (criticizing) easy.

“And, sure, there are things that hurt,” he added. “But I developed Teflon. People are going to criticize whatever you do. When you’re in this type of spotlight, in this environment, with this team ... as I said, I’ve got five million advisors. If there’s five million people in Toronto, I’ve got five million advisors. The job is not an easy job, it’s not supposed to be easy. It’s not supposed to be easy to win in the NHL — and it’s not easy to win in the NHL.

“It’s all about winning,” Carlyle continued. “Winning makes your life easier and makes it better. The thing about when you lose here in Toronto, you don’t breathe for a couple of days. When you win, you can exhale.”

Sitting back in a kitchen chair, his cellphone ringing off and on, Carlyle added, “My biggest dilemma is we weren’t able to deliver for the fans here and earn the respect back for the organization. That was my goal. That is what I envisioned and that’s what my main goal was, to have a winning hockey club to bring back some respect to the organization. I feel we did not build the respect back for the organization. That’s the most important thing that I felt taking the job here. And whoever does it, hats off to them.”

Carlyle acknowledged that consistency has been the biggest problem with the Leafs this season.

“That’s part of the reason I’m not the coach of the Leafs, because I couldn’t make them consistent,” he said. “And it’s frustrating in the sense that you’re frustrated when things don’t go the way you planned them to go or the way you expected them to go. And that goes up and down the ladder. It goes down to the players, it goes down to the people who work in the sports staff and it goes up the ladder to the coaching staff, to management, to ownership, to the fans. That’s just the way this market is, and if you’re not ready to accept that, you’re in for a lot of trouble and you shouldn’t be here.”

Even though he could have taken an extended period of time off and chilled after being fired by the Ducks in November 2011 (having four more years left on his contract), Carlyle has no regrets coming to Toronto, where he was drafted in 1976 out of his hometown Sudbury Wolves and played for the Leafs for two years.

“I thought it would be intense,” he said, “and I thought the media responsibility would be like 30% of the job. And that held true. But the intensity goes far beyond that because it becomes a ... I look at it as a woodpecker hitting a mailbox. It never stops. And it comes from different directions and it comes from different people. And though it doesn’t really affect me personally, it affects your support group and the people around you. I have family in Ontario, I’ve got brother-in-laws here, I’ve got good friends and it feeds to those people. And they in turn tell you. I got to the point where ... I won’t say I never read the papers — yeah I read the papers sometimes — but most of the time I tried to ignore it. I just tried to do my job.”

After his brother-in-law’s funeral later this week, Carlyle has to get ready to go under the knife on Jan. 22 in a Toronto hospital, another burden weighing on his mind. The coach said his back has been bothering him greatly since last summer.

“I had the injections and I had the numbness in my leg and my toes so the doctors feel they can go in and possibly help with a little bit of a cleanup on the disc that’s pinching my nerve,” he said. “And then I’ll get my feet underneath me and I’ll make a decision and probably go to California. I have a home in San Diego.”

When asked of any other health issues he has had to deal with after a 17-year NHL career (which included winning the Norris Trophy as the league’s best defenceman in 1981), Carlyle laughed and said his neck bothers him from time to time — another disc problem.

“I had that from an old hockey injury, I got hit from behind by Tiger Williams into the boards and jammed up my neck and that’s the only real injury I could remember,” he said. “That happened in the old L.A. Forum.”

Carlyle said it probably won’t be long before he’s champing at the bit to get behind the bench again once everything settles down.

“I plan on coaching again. We’ll see what the future brings. There’s lots of qualified coaches out there. There’s three coaches in Canada that got fired this year: There’s Dallas Eakins (Edmonton), Paul MacLean (Ottawa) and myself, and there’s Pete DeBoer out of New Jersey. So there’s lots of competition for the position, as there always is.

“This was a chapter in my life. I was fortunate to be able to coach the Leafs,” he continued. “We left on a winning record, not a great winning record, but I understand that. We’re not boasting about what we accomplished. But are they better today than when we got here? That’s the way I look at it.”

When asked if he believes the Leafs would have made the playoffs this year with him still behind the bench, Carlyle smiled.

“Well, we had a chance. That’s all,” he said. “It goes back to, again, are they going to get goaltending? Are you going to get stiff enough defence that’s going to be able to prevent goals? And your special teams are going to have to win you games down the stretch.

“But I hope they win,” Carlyle added. “I hope they play like they can. There’s some good people here in (assistant coaches) Spotter (Steve Spott) and Pete Horachek and Rick St. Croix and Chris Dennis, and now I see they’ve brought in Steve Staios. They’re all good people. I wish them luck and I wish them success.”

Carlyle said it will be sad leaving Toronto once he sells his Etobicoke home, adding that “99%” of the fans he met over the years have been kind and warm.

“In general, people have been great,” he said. “I don’t have any issues with people in Toronto. They’re opinionated and you listen to their opinion and you smile and move on.”

Walking his guest toward the front door, Carlyle joked about his relationship with the Toronto media, offering proof that his granting the Sun some time shows he wasn’t such a bad guy.

“I didn’t kick you out of my house,” he said with a laugh.

​steve.buffery@sunmedia.ca