Following that season, in June 2019, Bettle left to join the Anaheim Ducks. He was replaced by Rich Rotenberg, who oversaw the Leafs\u2019 performance department for the next six seasons.<\/p>\n
Last summer, not long after Shanahan was dismissed as president, Rotenberg became the director of performance for Dubas\u2019 Pittsburgh Penguins. The Leafs, the most valuable franchise<\/a> in the NHL, did not replace him or Sachin Raina, who had the title of sports scientist and who also left to join the Penguins.<\/p>\n Injuries have been a major sore spot for the team this season. The relatively high age of the group and a compressed schedule due to the Olympics have both likely played a part in that. Injury levels are high<\/a> across the league. Still, Bettle said he believes the decision to enter this season without a director of sports science has been a factor, too.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s gone back to being a traditional hockey club now,\u201d Bettle said\u00a0in a recent interview. \u201cIt\u2019s back to how it was before I arrived. It\u2019s like it never happened. It\u2019s absolutely why they have more injuries.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou cannot have injury-free seasons the way they\u2019re currently set up,\u201d he continued. \u201cAnd that\u2019s no knock on anyone in particular \u2014 it just doesn\u2019t work.\u201d<\/p>\n The majority of NHL teams have some kind of performance director, a person tasked with overseeing the optimization of player performance.<\/p>\n The Leafs now lack anyone with such a title, though they currently employ Steven Hirsch as a sports science consultant. The team says it has also bolstered its medical and training staff<\/a> in other ways this season, adding an additional assistant strength and conditioning coach, an assistant dietitian and a third assistant athletic therapist, as well as consultants in mental health and mental performance.<\/p>\n The Toronto Raptors, meanwhile, have employed Alex McKechnie as their vice-president of player health and performance since 2011. It was on the recommendation of McKechnie, a close friend, that Bettle came on the Leafs\u2019 radar. Bettle was working as the Brooklyn Nets\u2019 head of strength and conditioning and director of nutrition when an email landed in his inbox from Dubas.<\/p>\n Bettle \u2014 who has a PhD in human performance, a master\u2019s in exercise science, and another degree in sport and exercise science \u2014 interviewed with the Leafs (still without a head coach or GM at that point) and was among the five finalists. The team then hired Mike Babcock as head coach and soon after, Bettle arrived in Toronto for yet another interview, this time with Babcock and Mark Hunter, the other assistant GM of the team; \u201ctwo old-school hockey guys\u201d he would have to win over.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat are you gonna do about Phil Kessel?\u201d Bettle remembers them asking him with a laugh about the winger who was traded to Pittsburgh soon after.<\/p>\n Lou Lamoriello became the GM later that summer.<\/p>\n Bettle won the job and got to work building a program that would keep players as healthy as possible, not just reactively when injuries struck but also in preventing them if at all possible.<\/p>\n On the day the NHL schedule was announced each summer, Bettle and Babcock would sit down together and plan out the team\u2019s practice schedule, with a sharp eye on sleep, travel, off-days \u2014 whatever was necessary to keep the group as fresh and healthy as possible over the long grind of 82 games.<\/p>\n It was a constant balancing act that required fine-tuning throughout \u2014 having players sit out practice, for instance, if the tracking data from the at-the-time new technology being used showed they were fatigued or at risk of injury.<\/p>\n \u201cHe never once overruled us,\u201d Bettle said of Babcock. \u201cIf we said a guy couldn\u2019t practise, if we said a guy wasn\u2019t ready to return to play, if we said a guy shouldn\u2019t play.\u201d<\/p>\n Winning over both Lamoriello and Babcock was essential to the program\u2019s success in the more traditional hockey climate.<\/p>\n \n Joffrey Lupul was the first \u201creal test\u201d for the Leafs\u2019 new sports science department. (John E. Sokolowski \/ Imagn Images)<\/p>\n The first \u201creal test\u201d came when Bettle noticed something in the tracking data, which showed Joffrey Lupul was straining one side of his groin over the other and then vice-versa.<\/p>\n Bettle recommended that Lupul sit out and rehab.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was the first time we had to proactively talk to Mike and be like, \u2018Hey, something\u2019s happening here,\u2019\u201d Bettle recalled. \u201cAnd he\u2019s like, \u2018Well, we don\u2019t know what that is.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Eventually he convinced Babcock that a blowup was coming if the team didn\u2019t act (and indeed, Lupul, after playing in 46 games, would require season-ending \u2014 and ultimately career-ending \u2014 sports hernia surgery in February).<\/p>\n \u201cWe won the battle,\u201d Bettle said. \u201cBut everybody got some scars from that.\u201d<\/p>\n The players could lean on the performance staff as much or as little as they liked. Each had individual risk data. If something changed in that data, there was someone there to look into why that might be and what might be required to fix it, be it supplemental sessions with the strength coach or extra time on the table.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously you can\u2019t predict certain injuries before they come but you can kind of see where you\u2019re weak and (determine) areas that need improvement,\u201d Tyler Bozak told The Athletic for a profile of Bettle<\/a> in 2017. \u201cSo you just kind of get stronger in those areas.\u201d<\/p>\n In time, the Leafs became one of the healthiest teams in the league.<\/p>\n \u201cWe went three and a half years without having a non-contact injury there,\u201d Bettle said, referring to the kind of injury that occurred absent contact with another player, puck or stick. \u201cWhich is unprecedented in professional sports.\u201d<\/p>\n Not having someone in his old role, someone with the qualifications to lead the performance department, is a mistake in Bettle\u2019s estimation.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s almost human nature, but you\u2019ve not got anybody to make a final decision who is impartial,\u201d he said. \u201cMy role was to not be the strength coach or the physio. It was to listen to all the information and then make an informed decision.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSometimes the strength coach was right. Sometimes the trainer was right,\u201d continued Bettle, who hosts \u201cThe Vitality Collective Podcast\u201d and is the executive director and co-founder of The Vitality Collective. \u201cBut if the strength coach thinks he\u2019s right and the trainer thinks he\u2019s right, those guys are going to butt heads. That\u2019s it. It\u2019s not going to be a \u2018let\u2019s talk about it and come out on the right side.\u2019 It never does. And when the GM becomes what the performance director should be \u2014 he doesn\u2019t know, he doesn\u2019t have enough information.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Joffrey](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/USATSI_9018524-scaled.jpg\")
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