Since September 28, 2005 at 2:22 pm this thread has been fiercely debated and now I have come to finish it after all! I shall use the most state of the art technology to solve this fiasco... WIKIPEDIA I SUMMON YOU!

"After taking control on Valentine's Day 1927, Conn Smythe immediately renamed the team the Maple Leafs (the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team had won the International League championship a few months earlier and had been using that name for 30 years). The Maple Leafs say that the name was chosen in honor of the Maple Leaf Regiment from World War I. As the regiment is a proper noun, its plural is formed by adding a simple 's' creating Maple Leafs (not *Maple Leaves). Another story says that Smythe named the team after a team he had once scouted, called the East Toronto Maple Leafs, while Smythe's grandson states that Conn named the team after the Maple Leaf insignia he had worn during the First World War."