Toronto Maple Leafs: The Four Worst Contracts in the NHL

One thing Toronto Maple Leaf fans can agree on is that the team is in a cap crunch.

The Toronto Maple Leafs may have spent to the salary cap, but they also do not have any bad long-term contracts.

General manager Kyle Dubas has successfully looked up all of his young core players, including Andreas Johnsson and Kasperi Kapanen.

The Leafs worst recent contracts were the five remaining years on Nikita Zaitsev’s deal, and the last year and six million owed to Patrick Marleau.

Dubas was able to excise these deals last summer, and use the savings to sign many depth players to single year contracts, a strategy that has worked out nicely for the Leafs this year.

When people mention bad contracts and the Maple Leafs a few names come to mind: David Clarkson, Tim Connolly, and Colby Armstrong.

Clarkson is notorious for his terrible seven-year, $36.75-million contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs where he only recorded 15 goals and 11 assists over two seasons.

The Leafs, correctly, traded him away to the Columbus Blue Jackets but recently reacquired him despite his lack of activity since 2016. He was subsequently placed on Long Term Injured Reserve (Leaf fans may know this as Robidas Island) to clear up cap-space.

Let’s examine the three worst contracts in the NHL right now.