Why Maple Leafs should consider selling at deadline even if they’re in a playoff spot
Everybody is used to the Leafs starting the season slowly and taking a few weeks to find their rhythm, but the story has been different this year. Until that win over the Penguins, the Leafs hadn’t won a single game in regulation since November 5 against the Utah Mammoth, and to this day the Leafs have only won in regulation and outshot their opponent in the same game, which was on October 28 against the Calgary Flames.
A 7-2 win should be celebrated, but the ‘just win baby’ mindset can only carry you so far. The Leafs are currently second-last in the Atlantic Division with a record of 11-11-3, and perhaps the only reason people haven’t fully mailed it in on this team is that the race for the Division has never been more wide open. The Tampa Bay Lightning currently sit atop the division with a record of 16-7-2, putting them nine points above the Leafs. Considering in recent years we have seen a point spread as high as 20 points or more between first and last, the Leafs are still very much in the fight even if they don’t deserve to be at this point.
The cupboards have never been more bare than they are right now. After a relatively quiet 2023-24 trade deadline, general manager Brad Treliving recognized the Maple Leafs’ performance last season as an indicator to go all-in at the deadline, trading a first round pick and Nikita Grebenkin for Scott Laughton, followed by a first-round pick and Fraser Minten for Brandon Carlo. Although the prices were hefty, a proven third-line centre in Laughton and a puck-moving right-handed defenceman in Carlo were two things this team needed desperately, and considering their pace towards winning the Atlantic Division for the first time since the realignments, they earned the upgrades.
This season, they have not earned any upgrades. They have allowed the fourth-most goals against in the league, their power play is 25th out of 32 teams, and their penalty kill, while slightly better, isn’t wowing anybody at 15th in the league. Aside from the penalty kill, their defensive stats have been a horror show.
Pair this with the fact that the Leafs have essentially nothing to offer from a draft-pick standpoint, and the likelihood of shelling out a Carlo-type return for any impact player seems pretty low. The playoff outlook might be a whole lot different come the deadline, but if it’s even a fraction wide open as it is now, it’s going to once again be a seller’s market, meaning prices for contenders looking to upgrade their roster will be higher than usual.
For as much as the team is struggling now, they do have an abundance of depth pieces, and they should look to recoup some assets for the players they don’t have room for. We’ve seen this team struggle even if their lineup is mostly healthy, and with players like Nick Robertson, Easton Cowan, and Jacob Quillan proving that they can hang in the big leagues, the Leafs should be using their depth as a strength at the deadline.
The likelihood of them trading anybody for a first-round pick is pretty low, and considering they only have a third-round pick and a fifth-round pick in this year’s draft, they should be looking to fill some of the gaps. Players like Calle Jarnkrok, Max Domi, Simon Benoit, Nicolas Roy, Dakota Joshua, and even Laughton and Carlo should be available if teams come calling, because even if the Leafs get rid of some or all of these players, their play is not going to be drastically shaped by having guys like Quillan and perhaps one of Henry Thrun/William Villeneuve step in to take their place.
Hell, if a team checks in on Oliver Ekman-Larsson, who has stepped into the fountain of youth and has 20 points in 25 games so far this season, they should consider listening to the offer. Considering what Carlo went for last season, you can imagine a team would look at Ekman-Larsson and the Cup he has under his belt and consider him a valuable addition for a team’s playoff run and beyond, with two more years on his contract at an affordable price.
The only situation I would advise against the Leafs selling is one where they catch a hot streak, go nuclear for a couple of months and find themselves at the top of the division. At that point, don’t break something that’s working for you, but the likelihood of this happening seems pretty low. And even if that was the situation, I wouldn’t think they should do what they did at last season’s deadline. Staying put would probably prevail.
The bottom line is that the Leafs are not on track to win the division like they were last season, and considering the team is already bone-dry for intriguing assets, this is not the year to invest in them. Let them figure it out themselves, and if they’re in the hunt but teams look to them for upgrades, don’t hang up the phone right away.