Toronto Maple Leafs: Patrick Kane Trade Rumours

Paul Bissonnette from Spittin’ Chiclets thinks the Toronto Maple Leafs will trade for Patrick Kane.

He believes the rumblings will come true and thinks Toronto Maple Leafs general manager Kyle Dubas will find a way to get this deal done.

A trade of this magnitude would have more than a few moving pieces. The number one obstacle for Dubas will be the salary cap. Kane has a $10.5 million cap hit. Toronto could negotiate for the Chicago Blackhawks to retain 50% of Kane’s salary. However, that will increase the asking price. An asking price that I’m sure is already high. (Salary cap info from capfriendly.com)

Kane, at 50% retained, would be $5.25 million against the salary cap for Toronto. The Maple Leafs will need to ship out more than $5.25 million as they are already $1.49 million over the salary cap limit. No matter which player(s) from Toronto’s active roster go to Chicago, they will want draft picks or prospects included.

Chicago is in a rebuild, so they are thinking of the team’s future more than its present. They will want a younger player with term or player(s) with expiring contracts. Chicago can trade away those expiring contracts at the trade deadline for more draft picks or prospects. Toronto doesn’t have an abundance of draft picks, but they have plenty of prospects.

What the Toronto Maple Leafs Could Offer for Patrick Kane

The question is, would the Leafs even want to add Patrick Kane?  Obviously any team would want the future Hall of Famer, if there was no salary cap. So leaving aside whether or not he’d fit in on this roster or whether this would be the best use of assets and cap space, what kind of package could the Leafs put together for Kane?

It is hard to see Toronto parting ways with Mitch Marner, William Nylander or John Tavares, and we know they’ll never trade Auston Matthews.

Another option for Toronto would be to put a package together involving Alex Kerfoot ($3.5 million), Justin Holl ($2 million),along with picks and prospects. Both Kerfoot and Holl are unrestricted free agents after this season, so the Hawks would be taking them just to make the salary work, and would likely flip them at the deadline.

The additional picks and prospects would be hard to gauge.  Given recent NHL transactions, you’d have to figure just eating half of Kane’s contract would cost a first, and in addition to that there’d have to be several picks and prospects – and it would probably be a pretty high cost.

It’s not like Chicago is going to trade Kane away for nothing – he’s coming off a 92 point season.

If the Toronto Maple Leafs acquire Kane they would have a top-six of Marner, Matthews, Kane, Nylander, Tavares, and Michael Bunting. Toronto would have the best top-six in the NHL and would have no problem scoring goals.

Adding Patrick Kane to this lineup would make it incredibly hard to play against the Toronto Maple Leafs.