Prospect Landon Sim was skating with the Maple Leafs at the Ford Performance Centre this summer when he approached John Tavares.
鈥淒o you remember me?鈥 Sim asked the Leafs assistant captain.
Turns out Sim’s father, Jon, played with . It was toward the end of the elder Sim’s 479-game career and the beginning of Tavares’s when Landon tagged along with his dad to the rink. Tavares, 34, is 13 years younger than Jon Sim and 13 years older than Landon.
鈥淗e sat beside Tavares,鈥 Sim said. 鈥(Tavares) gave me a stick. And then I went up to him when I was training here in the summer, and he just couldn’t believe it.鈥
Sim, a five-foot-11, 21-year-old centre, signed as a free agent with the Marlies and is in rookie camp with prospects like Easton Cowan, Ben Danford and Jacob Quillan, preparing for a weekend tournament in Montreal.
While the former London Knights forward 鈥 he often played centre on Cowan’s line 鈥 might be a long shot to make the NHL, he’s not to be underestimated the way hockey runs through his blood.
鈥淚 know enough about (Sim) to know that he’s a competitive player,鈥 Marlies coach John Gruden said. 鈥淵ou can see it the way he practised today. He’s engaged. He’s a winner. Definitely I can see there’s a lot to like there.鈥
GM Treliving says there’s opportunity for the 20-year-old prospect but coach Berube insists Cowan will need to be “a hound” to show he’s ready for
GM Treliving says there’s opportunity for the 20-year-old prospect but coach Berube insists Cowan will need to be “a hound” to show he’s ready for
Not only is Sim a winner, with a Memorial Cup to his credit, but so is his father. Jon Sim’s name is on the Stanley Cup won by the Dallas Stars in 1999.
鈥淚t’s pretty cool,鈥 Sim said of his father’s success. 鈥淗e was pretty hard on me growing up, and for the right reasons. Pushed me every day to make me earn everything. It’s been really good and really cool to look up to him and see how he made it, being an undersized forward (five-foot-10) who was a really good junior player and had to change his game to (make) the NHL.
鈥淚t’s something you look up to, finding a way to make it.鈥
Sim’s links with the Leafs go deeper still. His father played with Scott Laughton in the minors, and Landon Sim has already played a couple of games for Leafs coach Craig Berube. Sim was drafted by St. Louis in 2022, and got into a couple of exhibition games with the Blues.
鈥淚’ve met Chief (Berube) a bunch,鈥 Sim said. 鈥淗e coaches the right way, a way that would get me going. He’s straight up. He’s hard. And I think I like that. You see the type of player he was, fighting his way in the NHL. It’s hard not to play your hardest for a guy like that.鈥
Sim and the Blues parted ways, with injuries being part of the back story.
鈥淚 don’t think I was the best player I could have been,鈥 Sim said of his time when the Blues owned his NHL rights. 鈥淚 worked hard, had some injuries. They were lingering and it didn’t end up working out.鈥
London coach Dale Hunter is a believer.
鈥淗e’s a feisty guy. And he’s character guy, too,鈥 Hunter said. 鈥淣et-front guy. He will do the dirty work for getting the puck back.鈥
Sim also had a tryout with the Devils before signing with the Marlies.
鈥淚 think the game I play is a game that the Leafs organization needs a little bit,鈥 Sim said. 鈥淚 like playing hard and I like being annoying to play against.
鈥淚’m super honoured to be here. It’s been a really good fit so far. And I hope to just keep working my way up.鈥
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