Toronto Maple Leafs: 3 Potentially Necessary Trades for Auston Matthews

The Toronto Maple Leafs are now almost two full weeks since Auston Matthews was eligible to sign an extension and the two sides have yet to settle on a contract.

The goal should always for the Toronto Maple Leafs to find a way to extend Matthews and not have to go down the trade route.

I believe that you ask Matthews how long he wants and for how much, you then put pen to paper.  However, if the two sides enter August and have not yet settled on a contract, GM Brad Treliving has to explore trading their top player.

The first overall pick from the 2016 NHL Entry Draft has been everything fans could have imagined.  On October 12, 2016, the phenom entered the league and scored four goals in his debut and since then no other player has scored more goals than Matthews.

The 299 goals that the 2017 Calder Trophy winner has scored is two more than Alex Ovechkin who has played 27 more games, while Connor McDavid sits third while playing 43 more games.  In fact, the top 15 goal scorers over that time frame have all played more games than Matthews with the exception of Nikita Kucherov who trails Matthews by 91 goals.

His scoring prowess has led to a pair of Rocket Richard Trophies, a Hart Trophy and the Ted Lindsay award as the best player in the league selected by his peers.

If trade route is where the organization has to go down, they do have a small complication with being able to trade Matthews as he had a No Movement Clause kick in on July 1.  However, I do not see this as being a problem, as the only factor in this is that Matthews gets to pick where he gets traded to.

A team acquiring Matthews will likely want to sign an extension any ways, which would mean they wouldn’t pay the price to acquire him unless they new they were getting him long term (with one exception, we will save that for our third team).

Here is a look at three possible teams that may make sense for a trade to occur to send the league’s top goal scorer. (stats nhl.com).

Toronto Maple Leafs: 3 Sad but Potentially Necessary Trades for Auston Matthews

To Los Angeles: Auston Matthews

To Toronto: Quinton Byfield, Brandt Clarke, Kevin Fiala, 2024 1st Round Pick

The Los Angeles Kings are acquiring a top three player in the league, in his prime and ready to sign an extension.

We all know what the Kings get in the trade, but what are the Toronto Maple Leafs getting back?

In Quinton Byfield, the organization gets the second overall pick from the 2020 NHL Entry Draft who has not quite been able to make his mark yet.  He is a 6’5″ center that uses his body about as much as Matthews.

He averaged just 14 minutes of ice-time with the Kings last season and collected just 22 points in 53 games, while also spending some time in the AHL this past season.

Byfield is a big risk as he hasn’t been able to solidify himself as an NHL player at this point in his career, but he is just turning 21-years old in August and did collect four points in six playoff games.

Brandt Clarke would be the big add in this trade and he was rated by NHL.com as the Kings second best prospect going into last season.

Clarke was a standout for the Team Canada during the 2023 World Junior Championships where he averaged more than a point per game.  During his CHL season he was named to both the OHL and CHL First All-Star Teams after collecting 61 points in just 31 games.  He followed that up with another 23 points in 12 playoff games.

The former eighth overall selection is a 6’2″ right handed shot defenseman and could be that cornerstone blue liner the team has always wanted.

The final player the Toronto Maple Leafs would acquire is a solidified NHL player the team knows will help in Kevin Fiala.  He is an established 25-goal scorer that has averaged more than a point per game over the last two seasons and turns 27 years old later this month.

Fiala is signed through the 2028-29 season at a cap hit of $7.875 Million per season.

The first round pick is just a topper that the club will get back in the deal.

The only problem with the trade for Los Angeles is that they would now have Matthews, along with Philip Danault, Anze Kopitar and Pierre Luc Dubois down the middle.

Edmonton Oilers

To Edmonton: Auston Matthews (35% Retained)

To Toronto: Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Evan Bouchard, 2024 1st Round Pick, 2025 1st Round Pick

I really don’t see this deal happening, I think Matthews has three teams he would play for and that is Toronto, New York or Los Angeles, but who knows and this would be kind of fun.

Matthews would likely only go to Edmonton for one season and then become a free agent, however Edmonton is all-in for the Stanley Cup next season.  I know a good portion of Oilers fans think Ryan Nugent-Hopkins is the third best player in the league behind Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl; and believe they are giving up the best player in the trade.  That is just not the case.

By acquiring Matthews, fans of the NHL get to see more of what they were teased during the last World Cup when the two first overall picks, Matthews and McDavid skated together.

Having the two best players skate together could see Matthews score 80 and McDavid close in on 200-points.

What the Leafs get is a quality center in RNH who makes a cap friendly $5.125M through the 2028-29 season.  The type of money gives you a quality second line center, that can jump up into the first line role.  He collected 104-points last season, but I don’t see that ever happening again and he is more likely to come back down to the 50-60 point range.

Evan Bouchard gives the Toronto Maple Leafs a top four right handed shot defenseman with a bomb from the point.

The Oilers former first round pick has now collected 40-points in back-to-back seasons and broke out during this past playoffs when he collected 17-points in just 12 games.

Signing Matthews is the most important thing and all indications are that he wants to stay in Toronto, but for whatever reason he wants to move on you have to explore a trade.