Brad Treliving Enters Pivotal Trade Deadline Facing the Toughest Decisions Yet
The Toronto Maple Leafs are needing to improve ahead of their strong playoff run, but do they have the ability to actually get a deal done without consequence?
With the trade deadline a month away, and already things getting heated with blockbuster deals left and right, the Toronto Maple Leafs are hoping to be the next club who brings aboard the big piece to make a deep playoff push.
But as the names tick off the list and Toronto stays quiet, fans are getting frustrated and you can't blame them. Though, it might not be something the Leafs GM has much control over.
Brad Treliving Has Little To Work With At Trade Deadline
It's not a secret that the Maple Leafs are in a cap crunch, but the issue lies beyond that. They have 10 players on their roster with trade protection accounting for over $70M in cap space; so moving them would be a very difficult ask.
Beyond the obvious names like Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner, players like Max Domi and David Kampf have big no-movement clauses. Those two combine for $6.15M and considering how terrible they've been compared to their value; it's a huge money sink.
Nick Robertson, Connor Dewar and Pontus Holmberg are not going to yield a reasonable return and no team is going to want to take on those deals if they aren't getting any value (the trio have a combined four goals and 17 points in 113 games).
Sure, the team could dump salary with a Morgan Rielly trade but if he goes anywhere he needs to a) give the okay and b) Toronto needs to ensure a team is going to want to take his massive $7.5M cap hit for a regressing blueliner.
So What Can Brad Treliving And The Maple Leafs Do?
First off they need to cut dead weight. Ryan Reaves and Conor Timmins need to go one way or another, either through waivers or for contract termination. Waiving Reaves and terminating Timmins saves the team $2M.
They also need to make sure that whatever trade they do make comes with money saved not money taken in. It's going to take a miracle but moving a Morgan Rielly or Max Domi would help a ton.
A potential deal that could save Toronto money would be one with a team they're quite familiar with; the San Jose Sharks.
This move would give the Maple Leafs $2.6M in cap space saved, while also adding a better offensive (and defensive) blueliner in Ferraro, as well as shoring up their third line center woes with Kunin as Domi slides to the wing.
Kunin, 27, has 11 goals and seven assists in 54 games with San Jose, but adds 54 blocks, 136 hits and a 48% faceoff win percentage; he plays the penalty kill, and gives Craig Berube the scrappy offensive weapon he needs.
He is a free agent at the end of this season and comes with a $2.75M cap hit.
Ferraro, 26, is a hometown Toronto boy who would add some offensive help to Toronto's blueline, but give them a much stronger defenseman.
He has 77 blocks and 115 hits and would give the team another shutdown defenseman for this year and the next at only a $3.25M hit.
The bottom line is that at the end of the day, Brad Treliving knows he needs to make a move. He's handcuffed by some pretty lucrative contracts and it's ultimately down to a lot of players to make the final decision.
But there's ways for it to work, and he wouldn't of lasted this long if he didn't have a trick up his tailored suit sleeve.
