The Toronto Maple Leafs are completely capped out.
After signing Mitch Marner, the Toronto Maple Leafs have something like $13 million dollars on the LTIR (injured reserve contracts don’t count against the cap).
They are currently in such cap trouble that adding player to fill lineup holes at the trade deadline or sooner will be impossible.
They are so maxed out that people don’t know what they’ll do once the injuries to Zach Hyman and Travis Dermott have healed.
Some have theorized that even before that happens, they’ll have to carry less players on their roster, or make bad decisions like send down Rasmus Sandin because he makes $900 K and not $700 K.
This could happen, but it doesn’t have to.
How to Fix the Toronto Maple Leafs Cap Woes
Kasperi Kapanen and Rasmus Sandin.
That’s how the Leafs fix their problems.
One thing we’ve learned from the pre-season so far, it’s that Kasperi Kapanen looks awesome on the John Tavares-Mitch Marner line.
Hyman doesn’t score enough to warrant first line minutes, and Kapanen is one of the fastest players in the NHL. This is an improvement.
Another thing we learned is that Rasmus Sandin is an NHL player.
So with the emergence of Kapanen and Sandin, Cody Ceci and Zach Hyman are expendable.
The two players combine to make $6.5 million dollars. Obviously, based on today’s cap, Hyman’s savings wouldn’t effect the amount available, because he’s not currently counting against the cap, but moving him does solve the problem of having to fit him onto the roster.
Hyman is a decent player and a fan favorite, but if Kapanen is playing on the left wing, the Leafs also have Johnson, Moore, and Mikheyev (who looks good so far).
That makes Hyman expendable.
As for Ceci, I’ve been impressed with his play so far, but he’s clearly got the one bad contract on this team. There’s no rush, but once Travis Dermott is ready, he’s damn expensive for a fourth liner.
Sandin makes him expendable.
Once the Leafs welcome back their injured players, if they moved Ceci and Hyman, they’re looking at $3.5 (roughly) in cap space. That’s enough at the deadline to acquire a top line talent, because cap hits get prorated.
The Toronto Maple Leafs might really believe in Cody Ceci. Maybe they think Zach Hyman is a legitimate top line player. Perhaps they’ve already got everything worked out regarding how they’ll maintain enough flexibility for the season, or how they’ll add to the team later.
But to me this is the most obvious one, because Ceci is the obvious bad contract on the team, and both players play too high in the lineup, have movable contracts, and make more money then they’re probably worth.