Brad Treliving has made it known that he has no intentions of fielding offers on his core group of players. Namely Morgan Rielly, Auston Matthews and William Nylander. If you want you could toss John Tavares’ name into that group as well, but after taking a massive pay cut and playing the way he has, I think they’d want him on their roster even if they were willing to move the others in a quick re-tool.
We should also keep that in mind. It’s possible to turn this around quickly. There’s no need to “tear it down to the studs” as they say. While I’m going to try to make a case for trading the star players on the team, there would still be plenty left behind to build upon and, depending on the theoretical trades that could be made, the team could find themselves back in the playoffs in 2027. In order to take this route the management group simply needs to accept a few simple truths about this roster.
The first thing they have to accept is that, as it’s currently constructed, they aren’t about to win a ton of games. That, combined with the fact that the Boston Bruins are well on their way to making a top 10 pick with the Leafs’ (top 5 protected) 1st round selection this year is reason enough to ask if sweeping changes should be made.
The second thing they have to accept is that the core group of players haven’t shown the ability to step up to the plate when it matters. We can rehash the stats from games 5-7 in all of the playoff series of yesteryear, but we don’t need to do that, it’s been spoken about enough at this point. In short, we know that when the chips are down this team folds like a cheap suit.
In contrast, the Edmonton Oilers are off to a slow start as well and there’s a lot of chatter about making changes to their roster, as well as the team trying to trade for a goaltender. That’s a very understandable route for that organization to take. Nobody is suggesting they move on from star players such as Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl or Evan Bouchard. Unlike the Leafs’ stars, those players have been to the Stanley Cup Final two years in a row and have shown that when they make the playoffs they can get it done. If you ask me, Edmonton is as dangerous of a playoff team as any other group in the NHL and that’s true whether they get into the post season as the first or final team. That’s what makes their situation different than the one in Toronto. If we were witness to a group of star players that showed the ability to lead their team into the 3rd or 4th round then I’d quickly agree with those that are arguing that this doesn’t need to be torn down.
The simple truth of the matter is that the Leafs have only made the 2nd round twice since Auston Matthews entered the league and both times they were embarrassed by the Florida Panthers.
The current situation is that the team is hoping to get mostly healthy so they can go on a run to make the playoffs. I started writing this before last night’s game in Columbus, when they got their wish. Auston Matthews, Matthew Knies and Nicholas Roy returned to the lineup and they went on to beat the Blue Jackets 2-1 in overtime. While those players didn’t play poorly, they won on the back of a Joseph Woll goaltending clinic in which he made several spectacular saves as the defensive system broke down in front of him. From there two opportunistic points from William Nylander sealed the deal. Rest assured that management will take that win and hope it gets strung together with many more, but I don’t see it as a reason to forego change.
My simple question is what’s the end game? Why wait for players to get healthy and hope that they make the playoffs and lose in the first round once again? Why believe that this is the year they’ll not only pull themselves out of a hole they created for themselves in the regular season standings, but then figure out the playoffs as well and go on a deep run? Let’s not forget that even when they were relatively healthy to begin the year, they still weren’t playing well, which makes waiting for them to be healthy so you can “see what you have” even more obtuse.
The answer to that question might be simple.
To me, the current decisions don’t appear to be ones that are being made for the betterment of the organization. It feels like job-saving decisions, where the GM refuses, or isn’t allowed to admit that the team he and the people before him built simply isn’t good enough and they need to start again. Basically, Brad Treliving was brought in to shape the current group into a Stanley Cup winner and he, nor anybody above him can be convinced that in order to do that they first need to remove the parts that have continuously shown that they’re incapable of leading the team past the 2nd round.
A further argument is that a coaching change should be made before you give up on this group completely. I’m not about to argue that a coaching change isn’t necessary. Quite the opposite, I believe it is, but it’s also evident that it wouldn’t be enough. When Craig Berube was hired it was generally met with fanfare. The understanding was that his system would demand a simple, yet physical brand of hockey from his players. His system was supposed to provide solid defense and less of the run-and-gun offense that we witnessed under former bench boss, Sheldon Keefe. Instead the Leafs are the 4th last team in the NHL in GA/GP with a mark of 3.61, while they allow the 2nd most shots against at 31.2/GP. Worse is that, while they are 4th best in the NHL in Hits/60, they’re still being pushed around and embarrassed physically. This allows players such as the Xhekaj brothers in Montreal and Nikita Zadorov in Boston to run amuck when they play the Leafs, because the team has no answer to the physical force that those players represent. Yes, players such as Dakota Joshua, Bobby McMann and Simon Benoit are credited with a lot of hits, but they aren’t the pugilists that you’d like to have around when the gloves come off. This isn’t a call to sign another version of Ryan Reaves, but at least when he was with the team they had somebody that could go on the ice and look those players in the eye without fear. That’s still part of the game in today’s NHL and they need a solution for it.
Beyond the system, Berube was said to hold his players accountable and we can see that that simply isn’t true. The fact that Max Domi wasn’t just in the lineup last night while better players were scratched, but was afforded an opportunity to play on the top line alongside Matthews and Knies is a testament to that. After the season he has had he should be a frequent scratch, but instead he’s given every opportunity you could ask for and continues to fail, yet it still goes beyond him. Berube continuously calls the Leafs a veteran group, but that has as much to do with the fact that Easton Cowan is the first young player he’s given a real opportunity to that wasn’t on the roster before he arrived than anything. Alex Steeves, Fraser Minten, Nikita Grebenkin and now Jacob Quillan have all had sniffs at making the lineup, but none have managed to stick. As of this morning Minten’s 8pts in Boston would be ahead of Max Domi, Nicholas Roy, Dakota Joshua and Scott Laughton (yes, he has been injured a lot, but 0pts in 5 games is still 0pts), who are all players that were either brought in to play Berube’s style of hockey, or players that he gives ample opportunity to. Alex Steeves has manage to post 3 goals and 4pts in 9 games for the Bruins as well. His 9 games played is the most he has suited up for in a single NHL season in his career. He’s playing 11:40 TOI/GP, which is comparable to Calle Jarnkrok, Steve Lorentz and Dakota Joshua and has produced as much on the scoresheet as they have in half as many games played. While I’m not going to lose sleep over Steeves leaving the organization, it’s the continued scratching of players that show they can contribute, as Steeves did last year and Quillan has this season, that is getting a little old.
This brings us back to the point of all of this. The reset button is there and it needs to be pushed. In order to do that you need the guy at the top, Keith Pelley, to step in and make it happen. While I realize that they’re nowhere near doing that the timing couldn’t be better. People are quick to point out that the Eastern Conference has been a dog fight this year. The difference between 1st in the East and last is just 9pts and the Leafs are only 4pts out of the final wild card spot. I’m sure that the organization agrees and also sees this as a reason to stay the course, but I see it as an opportunity to sell high… very high.
With the standings so compacted it means that the number of sellers at the trade deadline will be far fewer than the number of buyers. Even the teams that are looking to sell, for the most part, aren’t ones that want to tear it down completely. As of this morning just 5 teams trail the Leafs in the NHL standings and three of those (Vancouver, Calgary, Buffalo) want to be considered contenders within the next few years. The other two (Nashville, St. Louis) appear to be willing to move some major pieces, but none of those pieces compare with what the Leafs would have to offer if they’d just man up and ask the core to waive their no-trade clauses. Also, there are a handful of teams that have transferred out of the seller department and entered buyer mode. It’s possible that any one of Montreal, the New York Islanders, Philadelphia, Anaheim, Seattle, Utah or Chicago could enter into the conversation if star players were placed on the market. Some of those teams have been in the basement stocking their shelves for years and possess a plethora of near NHL ready high-end talent, as well as picks and on roster assets that they’d move to facilitate a trade. Of course the usual suspects (Carolina, Vegas, Colorado, Tampa, Ottawa, New Jersey, etc.) would also help to drive the prices high.
For recent comparison sake, Mikko Rantanen was traded to the Dallas Stars for two 1st round picks, two 3rd round picks and Logan Stankoven, who is a former 2nd round pick that boasted 43pts in 83 games in his NHL career at the time of the trade at just 21 years old. While Morgan Rielly’s return would be much lower, that would be the general vicinity in terms of a return for both of Matthews and Nylander. We also shouldn’t forget that before Rantanen was dealt to the Stars he was first acquired by the Hurricanes in exchange for 2nd and 4th round picks, former 2nd round pick Jack Drury and former 12th overall selection Martin Necas, who was scoring above a point-per-game at the time of the deal.
The return on “superstar” players can be immense, to say the least. With the proper deals the Leafs could fetch multiple young players that are already in the NHL, multiple near NHL ready prospects and picks and would still possess the aforementioned players (Tavares, Knies etc) to help all of those youngsters find their footing in the league. Add a top 5 selection in the 2026 NHL Entry Draft into the mix and in my opinion it’s a simple decision, you need to hit the reset button by way of removing Craig Berube, Auston Matthews, William Nylander and Morgan Rielly from the organization.
So many see this so clearly. My only question is why can’t the folks at MLSE realize it as well?