With training camp about six weeks away, new Toronto Maple Leafs’ general manager (GM) Brad Treliving has a lot of work ahead of him to get his team ready for the 2023-24 season. Not only are changes needed to get the team under the league salary cap, the lack of depth the Maple Leafs have at all positions will have to be addressed.
Looking at the Maple Leafs’ Goaltending
The starting and backup goaltending appears to be set. Ilya Samsonov will be number one after being awarded a one-year, $3.55 million contract by an arbitrator on July 23.
Joseph Woll has earned the backup position. He put together a record of 6-1 with a .932 save percentage (SV%) and a 2.16 goals-against average (GAA) in seven regular season starts. He then took over for the injured Samsonov during the postseason and gave the team a chance to win every game. Although his record was 1-2 in four appearances, he put up a .915 SV% and 2.43 GAA. The 24-year-old appears to be the real deal, and he should do well in the backup role this season.
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The next goaltender on the Maple Leafs’ depth chart is 24-year-old Keith Petruzzelli. He started the 2022-23 season signed to an American Hockey League (AHL) contract and has yet to play an NHL game. His two-year professional career has consisted of 33 games in the AHL and 30 games in the ECHL.
The only other goalie the Maple Leafs had in their system with NHL experience was Eric Kallgren. He had played 24 games for the team over the past two seasons. But he’s gone. He signed a one-year, two-way deal with the New Jersey Devils as an unrestricted free agent (UFA) this past summer. He could be missed.
We have to think the Maple Leafs will be looking to sign another goaltender with some NHL experience either to a cheap league-minimum deal or at least to a professional tryout contract (PTO) to give them some depth between the pipes.
Looking at the Maple Leafs’ Defense
As we wrote about in a previous post, the Maple Leafs have five defensemen with a ton of experience in Morgan Rielly, TJ Brodie, Mark Giordano, John Klingberg, and Jake McCabe. They also have a young developing sixth defenseman in Timothy Liljegren.
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After that, the next three players on their depth chart are 24-year-old Conor Timmins with 78 NHL games played, 25-year-old Maxime Lajoie with 72 games, and 27-year-old William Lagesson with 60 games.
Treliving has stated that he would like to add a defenseman with a bit of “snot” to his game. None of Timmins, Lajoie, or Lagesson have that element in their game. With the present salary cap situation, if Treliving is to acquire a more physical defenseman it will mean having to clear some space to do so.
There are some rumors floating around that Brodie and his $5 million cap hit could be moved. The problem there is that his present contract is back loaded and his actual salary for the upcoming season is $2.5 million higher than his cap hit.
Looking at the Maple Leafs’ Forwards
Working with the forwards is the area in which the Maple Leafs have the most options. In addition, they also have some AHL players who are at the point of their careers where the team needs to make a decision on whether to keep them beyond the 2023-24 season. This is the last season that Nick Robertson will be waiver-exempt, and Bobby McMann will require waivers to be sent down this coming season.
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If the season were to start today, the Maple Leafs could ice a team that is under the cap ceiling without risking losing anyone to waivers. But, to do so they would have to go with 11 forwards and seven defensemen. On top of that, the roster could not include a player who could be in the hunt for a Calder Trophy. That’s Matthew Knies.
In what was a small sample of three regular-season and seven playoff games last season, Knies did not look out of place in a Maple Leafs’ uniform. Ideally, he would be in the opening game lineup.
The Bottom Line
While the last few weeks have been relatively quiet, we expect things to heat up over the next month as Treliving tries to sort this all out. We’re not sure that any changes can be made to the team’s defense without moving money out somewhere else.
But where? And, when? There might yet be moves to be made before the season begins in October.
[Note: I want to thank long-time Maple Leafs’ fan Stan Smith for collaborating with me on this post. Stan’s Facebook profile can be found here.]
