The Toronto Maple Leafs tried to sneak Travis Boyd through waivers, but were unsuccessful.
Had the Toronto Maple Leafs been able to sneak Boyd through, he could have gone back and forth between the Taxi Squad and the lineup for the rest of the season, allowing the Leafs to use him as an extra forward, gain much needed roster flexibility, and save some cap money for the trade deadline.
Alas, while it was a good plan, it didn’t work out, and now Travis Boyd is a member of the Vancouver Canucks.
So what do the Leafs really lose?
Toronto Maple Leafs and Travis Boyd
Boyd was a grinder who found early success in his Leafs career and scored quite a few points given his limited role and icetime. In 20 games with the Leafs, Boyd scored three times and had eight points.
He was successful and people quickly became fans of his. Not that there was anything wrong with Boyd, but it continues to amaze how people fall in love with players who play the grinding/checking style while disregarding players who are just as good (or better) who play more cerebral games (like Nic Petan, for instance).
The Leafs, it should be noted, also seemed to prefer Boyd, although probably because the trade off on the fourth line between the two isn’t huge and Boyd brings an element the Leafs don’t have a lot of.
While people will likely lament the loss of Boyd to Vancouver, the facts are that he was a 44% player who simply wasn’t very good. The Leafs tended to get beaten whenever he played, and only a high shooting percentage prevented people from noticing. (Boyd’s on-ice shooting percentage was the highest on the Leafs).
Since the Leafs have Nick Robertson, Jason Spezza, Adam Brooks, Kenny Agostino, Pierre Engvall, Wayne Simmonds, Joe Thornton, Alex Barabanov, Nic Petan, Joey Anderson and Alex Galchenyuk, losing Boyd won’t matter in the slightest.
The Leafs have more depth at forward that any team in the NHL, and any one of the ten or eleven guys they will use instead now will be just as good. Possibly better.
The great thing about having so many options is that eventually one of them will hit a hot streak (like Boyd) or put up unexpectedly strong numbers (Spezza, Thornton).
Ultimately, it’s never fun to lose a player on waivers you’d prefer to keep, but this isn’t really going to have a huge effect on the Toronto Maple Leafs one way or the other.