Thankfully, the days of anxiously watching the draft lottery as a Toronto Maple Leafs fan are over.
No longer do you have to sit agonizingly on the edge of your seat as Bill Daly overturns cards, revealing one by one what teams did not have the ping pong balls in their favour that evening. It’s a tedious exercise and it’s great now that the Toronto Maple Leafs are no longer a part of it.
As Leafs fans, we know both the highs and the lows of the lottery. In 2015, Toronto was excruciatingly close from landing the first overall selection and Connor McDavid.
On the flip side, we all felt the elation of seeing the final card flip to reveal the Maple Leafs logo, handing Toronto Auston Matthews. At the very least, I know I was pretty ecstatic:
This year, and for the foreseeable future, the Toronto Maple Leafs do not have any direct stake in the lottery. So, as a Leafs fan, what should you be watching for? Who should you be cheering to win? And what’s the worst case scenario? Don’t fret: here is a definitive ranking of the possible lottery winners, from best to worst, from a Toronto perspective.