The Toronto Maple Leafs salary cap situation is almost perfect.
This probably comes as a surprise to people, as there is this persistent (and incorrect belief) that the Toronto Maple Leafs are somehow in “cap hell.”
Nothing could be further from the truth.
Other than the people who continue to ignore how good of a player William Nylander has become, there isn’t a more inaccurate narrative surrounding this team.
“You can’t win in the NHL while devoting almost half your salary cap to four players,” is one thing people say, which is a weird take, since no one ever tried it before.
What they don’t know is that according to game theory, the best use of money in strong-ling game (which means elite players drive wins) with a salary cap is to spend money on high-end players.
For instance, the math says that in the NHL a $9 million dollar player and a league minimum AHL player will help you more than two $5 million players will. The entire Leafs roster is built on this principle.
The Leafs might be tight against the cap, but they’ve actually spent their money really well, so it doesn’t matter. No point in having cap space if it means you have a worse roster.
The Leafs have no bad long-term contracts, and they have flexibility (the $11 million dollars they are paying non-core player Alex Kerfoot, Kasperi Kapanen and Andreas Johnsson gives them a ton of flexibility, since 30 other teams will trade for any of those players at any time).
This means they are in good shape.
Even if the cap does not go up.
Toronto Maple Leafs and a Flat Cap
If the cap does not go up, the Leafs are pretty much fine because the only players they have that are getting raises from this year to next are Justin Holl, Jack Campbell, Jake Muzzin and Pierre Engvall, and
Cody Ceci and Tyson Barrie will both be gone (most likely) and with them almost $7 million in cap space.
Subtract the raises from the exits and you get about a $4 million dollar surplus.
Players like Clifford and Spezza don’t factor in because they will just be re-signed or replaced for the same money.
A million for Robin Lehner comes off the books next year, and there will be savings for Clarkson and Horton because not all of their contracts can be hidden on the long-term I.R.
The Toronto Maple Leafs should be able to sign Dermott with the money they have, and he’s their only big-deal free-agent. There will even be a bit left over afterwards.
Then, if the Leafs want to sign Ilya Mikheyev, or they want to trade for someone, they will just have to trade roster players.
At some point they might find they want to save a million dollars, so they trade Holl and replace him with Liljegren. Or maybe they need $7 million for a potentially elite player, which means both Kapanen and Johnsson would have to go.
The point is, they have options.
And they also have Rasmus Sandin, Timothy Liljegren and Nick Robertson all ready to play in the NHL on entry-level, league minimum deals.
There are additional prospects – Adam Brooks, Igor Korshkev – who are knocking at the door too. Plus, don’t forget recent UFA signings Alexander Barabanov and Mikko Lehtenon.
If the cap fails to go up, it’s really going to hurt teams with bad long-term contracts the most. The Toronto Maple Leafs don’t have any of those, so they are going to be fine. (cap info capfriendly.com).
They are in the best position of any team in the league, since most of their long-term deals are for young players who are only getting better and whose contracts are only getting more team friendly with the passage of time.