Maple Leafs: A Comprehensive Guide to an Insufferable Summer.
By William Cann
The Salary Cap
If I’m going to analyze the roster moving forward, I need a blue print to work from. That begins with the salary cap. You can find all the information I used relevant to contracts from .capfriendly.com. I’m not Brandon Pridham, so this is just a snap shot for the sake of discussion. Take it with a grain of salt if you’re a perfectionist.
I’m also leaving off some prospects. I’m only adding the ones I feel have a chance to make an impact on the NHL roster in 2021-2022. If you disagree, fantastic, but that’s a debate for another article.
The Leafs currently have 18 UFA’s that are not included in this section. Here’s what the lineup looks like without any additional contracts, factoring in only players that Keefe was comfortable playing last year:
??/Matthews/Marner Rielly/Brodie Campbell/??
??/Tavares/Nylander Muzzin/Holl
Mikheyev/Kerfoot/Engvall Sandin/??
??/Brooks/??
Extras at forward with NHL experience: Nick Robertson, Joey Anderson.
RFA forwards: Nick Petan, Dennis Malgin.
Forward prospects: Mikhail Abramov, SDA, Filip Hallander, Rodion Amirov.
Extras on defense with NHL experience: Timothy Liljegren.
RFA defense: Travis Dermott, Joseph Duszak.
Defense prospects: Topi Niemela, Teemu Kivihalme.
Extras at goalie with NHL experience: Michael Hutchinson.
RFA goalies: Veini Vehvilainen.
Goalie prospects: Joseph Woll, Ian Scott.
The Leafs are looking at about $12,505,217 in cap space with a minimum of 6 roster spots to fill.
I’m going to add that I believe Kerfoot gets claimed by Seattle, which I’ll discuss later, so that leaves 7 open roster spots with about $16,000,000 in cap space. It’s important to note that of those 7 spots, 2 are in the top 6, 1 is a center, and 1 is a goalie. None of those spots are going to be cheap.
It’s easy to think that you can just plug in some ELC’s and call it a day, but I don’t think Dubas will do that. I don’t think enough guys are NHL ready and the Leafs need to win, they can’t experiment with prospects right now. Expect some FA signings/and or trades to fill most of these spots.
The Leafs will only have 31 of 50 contract slots filled at the time of writing this. That’s a lot of open contracts. I expect Dubas to be busy.