Toronto Maple Leafs Should Sign Cody Eakin or Sony Milano

The Calgary Flames surprisingly released Sonny Milano and Cody Eakin from their Professional Tryout (PTO) today, which means the Toronto Maple Leafs should capitalize.

The Toronto Maple Leafs depth is strong but they have a chance to make it even better by signing one of (or both) Eakin and Milano.

For months, I’ve hoped that the Leafs would sign Milano. The former first round pick is only 26-year-old, is a left-winger and scored 14 goals in the NHL last year with the Anaheim Ducks. Based on that stature, he felt like a perfect player that Kyle Dubas would give a tryout to.

As it currently stands, Toronto has 49 contracts signed, with a maximum of 50 allowed. That last contract is almost definitely going to Zach Aston-Reese, but they could still trade a contract out or potentially wait to lose a contract via waivers once the regular season starts, which would make them able to sign Eakin or Milano.

Eakin & Milano Would Both Be Great Fits With the Toronto Maple Leafs

In my opinion, Alex Kerfoot and Pierre Engvall have always been the most disposable players for the Leafs forward group. Although they are good players who can help Toronto, their contracts would indicate that they would be the first players traded.

With a combined salary of $5.75M, trading both Kerfoot and Engvall would make a ton of sense, especially if they were able to sign Milano and Eakin.

Eakin is a former 20-goal scorer and can play up and down the line-up, similarly to Kerfoot, while Milano is the same age as Engvall and put up the same amount of points as him last year.

Obviously Engvall’s size is a great factor, as he’s 6-foot-5, compared to Milano’s 6-feet, but at this point, Eakin and Milano would probably be happy making the league minimum.

Toronto could technically sign both of these players, ship Engvall and Kerfoot out the door and save roughly $3M on the salary. That $3M could then be pretty useful in acquiring someone like Jakob Chychrun, who only makes $4.6M.

I know this is some NHL 23 video game stuff I’m talking about, but these are the types of moves that Toronto needs to make to improve their team. Eakin and Milano would provide much more value than the $750K contract they would more than likely sign and it would open up a ton of options for a team that’s salary-cap strapped.

Overall, Kerfoot and Engvall are probably better players than Milano and Eakin but it wouldn’t be a noticeable difference, and the salary cap implications would make it worth it.

All of this probably won’t happen as it looks like Toronto is set with their roster right now, but you never know. Milano and Eakin are two interesting players who should be playing in the NHL next year, so it wouldn’t be the craziest idea for the Toronto Maple Leafs to sign one, or both of them.