Will These Rumored Trades Help the Toronto Maple Leafs?

As we get closer to the NHL trade deadline, trade rumors will continue to intensify for the Toronto Maple Leafs and others.

According to David Pagnotta, the Toronto Maple Leafs could possibly be interested in St. Louis Blues forward Ivan Barbashev and Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov. Like most rumors, these should be taken with a grain of salt.

Both players are on expiring contracts and will make good rental options for playoff-bound teams, though who the Leafs would take out of the lineup to add such players remains a mystery.

Leafs fans assume that general manager Kyle Dubas is looking to upgrade his top-six left-wing spot and bolster his defense for the playoffs, but that might not even be the case.

With Nick Robertson and Matthews Knies , not to mention Calle Jarnkrok or Alex Kerfoot, the Leafs have a lot of options for the left wing spot, while the defenseman everyone assumed that they would move has been doing really well as of late.

The Toronto Maple Leafs defense has suffered many injuries this season, and obviously Dubas would like to have as much depth as possible  and the Leafs are at least 10-12 deep for NHL quality depth defensemen.

For a team already sitting Conor Timmins, would Gavrikov even be enough to move the needle? It’s hard to say, but let’s check in on some players the Leafs could be interested in as we move towards the March trade deadline.

Checking In on the Players the Toronto Maple Leafs May Be Looking At

Ivan Barbashev

Barbashev is in his seventh season with the St. Louis Blues since being drafted by them in 2014.

The Blues selected him in the 2nd round with the 33rd overall pick. He had a career year last season with 26 goals and 34 assists for 60 points in 81 games.  He’s a good player, but I don’t think anyone was expecting him to score at a 40 goal pace.
(Stats from hockey-reference.com)

So far, Barbashev has six goals and 12 assists for 18 points in 39 games this season, which isn’t even close to what he did last year, but the Blues have struggled.

Since his career year came out of nowhere, and he seems to have everted back to his regular self, it’s hard to see him as a significant upgrade over any of the Leafs current options, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t see something in him they like, which could lead to him being a buy-lop option.

Fans will like that he plays with physicality and is not afraid to fight if needed.

He finished last season with 160 hits and has 82 this season.

The Toronto Maple Leafs only have one forward with more than 55 hits, and it’s Zach Aston-Reese with 84. He has a small salary cap hit of $2.25 million, which Toronto could easily find a way to add him. (Salary info from capfriendly.com)

Vladislav Gavrikov

Gavrikov is in his fourth season with the Columbus Blue Jackets.

He was drafted by Columbus in the 6th round of the 2015 NHL draft with the 159th overall pick. He is a big defenseman that can play a lot of minutes.

This season he is averaging 22:31 of ice time and has been used a ton due to the injury of Zach Werenski.

One drawback of Gavrikov’s game is he rarely hits for a guy who is 6’3, 213 Lbs.  The other is that he might not be that good.

He only has 38 hits this season, which would put him 4th in hits among Toronto defensemen. The main reason for adding him would be for added depth and the number of minutes he can play. With nine points in 37 games, Toronto won’t be relying on him for points.

He is left handed, doesn’t hit much, and has horrible numbers.  Even discounting the numbers as being caused by having to play on Columbus, and likely in situations he shouldn’t be deployed in, there doesn’t seem to be much to recommend Gavrikov to the Leafs.

They have a ton of depth players, and there is no way that Timothy Liljegre, Rasmus Sandin, Justin Holl, Mark Giordano, TJ Brodie or Morgan Rielly are coming out of the lineup for him.  In the case of injury, the Leafs would turn to Conor Timmins, and would have Gavrikov competing with Jamie Benn and Carl Dahlstrom for depth minutes.

Considering that Columbus would probably like to turn him into at least a second-rounder, I doubt the Leafs would have interest.