No. 3: Damon Severson
Hypothetical Trade:
- Toronto Maple Leafs acquire: Damon Severson
- New Jersey Devils acquire: Rasmus Sandin, Nick Abruzzese, 2024 2nd Round Pick
This is a shot-in-the-dark in terms of trade potentials, but the New Jersey Devils and Toronto Maple Leafs have been known to do business in the past.
With Severson as a pending UFA, if the team doesn’t think they can re-sign him, they may want to trade him to secure an asset before he leaves for nothing. What better asset to get in return than a 22-year-old defenseman with top-four potential?
By trading Sandin for Severson, it would only guarantee one-year of Severson’s availability, but when you’re in a win-now mode, that’s fine. You need to put your chips into the middle every single time you have a chance to win, and having Severson over Sandin would improve the roster.
The right-handed shooting defenseman has been a solid point-producer over his career, and has good size at 6-foot-2, 205 pounds. The former Kelowna Rockets star has lived up to his potential of being a top-four defenseman and has done so, playing on a terrible Devils team.
If he played in Toronto, in a better system, on a better roster, there’s no doubt his game would only improve and he’d be a steal at just over $4M AAV.
As previously mentioned, the best case scenario is to re-sign Sandin, but if the two sides can’t agree on a deal, trading him and getting someone like Severson in return would be a huge win.