Toronto Maple Leafs: Playing Max Domi In Top-Six a HUGE Mistake

The Toronto Maple Leafs, like a lot of people, overrate Max Domi.

Hopefully, that doesn’t lead to the Toronto Maple Leafs playing Max Domi in their top six, because that would be an extremely bad decision.

Max Domi isn’t a very good NHL player.

In fact, he’s a borderline replacement player, and signing him for $3 million dollars was a ridiculous mistake.

Though, to be fair, Domi is a great passer and has excellent offensive skills (just not elite enough ones to compensate for being a one-dimensional player with horrible defense), and since he is signed for only one year, the risk is low since he can always be moved at the deadline to make cap space for a better player if it doesn’t work out.

Still, signing him was silly because the Leafs have Nick Robertson, Bobby McCann, Alex Steeves, Roni Hirvoen, Nick Abruzzese, Pontus Holmberg, Ty Voit, and Fraser Minten and I guarantee at least one or two of those guys are better than Domi right now.

And even if they aren’t, how do you know if you keep blocking all your young players with overrated name-brand players?

Toronto Maple Leafs: Playing Max Domi In Top-Six a HUGE Mistake

Now, clearly I am not a fan of Max Domi.

I don’t see the appeal, and I find the fact that he keeps getting credited for being a gritty and tough player to be the height of insanity – he is 5’10, and can’t play defense, so who cares if he’s gritty or throws the odd hit?

Domi tends to lose his minutes, and he scores at a 5v5 rate similar to Alex Kerfoot while being much less versatile and infinity worse at defence.

Despite having a recognizable name, Domi is much, much worse than Alex Kerfoot and is thus a major downgrade for the Leafs.  (Kerfoot, O’Reilly, Acciari and Bunting are all better than Domi). (stats naturalstattrick.com).

But none of this matters.

All that matters is that the Toronto Maple Leafs do not dress Domi in their top-six.

You couldn’t put him on the second line with Tavares and Nylander because the defensive awareness of that line would be horrid.

Obviously he can’t play with Matthews and Marner because the Leafs need to replace Bunting’s value and Knies with them is the best path to doing so.

Domi can be a solid 3rd or 4th liner if you carefully shelter him.  However, since he’s a name-brand singing there is always the chance the team wants to showcase him at the top of the lineup.

This would be a mistake.

Those spots need to go to Knies and Bertuzzi (and in an ideal world, Robertson would win a job and Bertuzzi would be on the 3rd line).

Speaking of Robertson, he’s most likely to lose minutes to Domi and that’s one of the worst things about signing him.  To be honest, I find it hard to see any upside to this signing, and would prefer the Leafs to have signed almost anyone else.

However, Domi can be effective offensively in a limited role.  That absolutely cannot include him in the top-six because Domi is not a top-six player on a competitive team.