If Brad Treliving and Craig Berube have learned anything about the Toronto Maple Leafs of late it is that they have a serious problem up the middle.
Not only are the Toronto Maple Leafs seriously thin at centre, they now have to contend with an already superior Carolina Hurricanes team that just added one of the best players to ever be moved in-season to their roster.
Besides a plethora of injuries, the Leafs have also been trying to fit a square peg in a round hole for the majority of the season with Max Domi at the center ice position, but it appears the duo making the decisions have finally realized it doesn't work. This has left both Pontus Holmberg and David Kämpf, two guys who should be fighting for fourth line duties getting second line center roles throughout the season.
Bottom line: even at full health, the Leafs have no depth at centre and desperately need a solid third-line option.
While many have spoken about Ryan O'Reilly, Yanni Gourde or Scott Laughton being viable options to bring into the fold, I think that Treliving should go bigger. Especially now that he has to get into an arms race with the Hurricanes if he wants to win this year.
Toronto Maple Leafs Should Try to Trade for Tage Thompson
The Buffalo Sabres are yet again at the bottom of the league and have no chance of making the playoffs. While they have a ton of individual talents on the team, there continue to fail as a team and Treliving has to convince general manager Kevyn Adams to move center Tage Thompson.
Thompson is in year two of a seven year deal that pays him $7.14 milion per season against the salary cap. He is a former 40-goal scorer who has battled injuries the last couple of years, but has bounced back this year to already reach 25-goals on the season.
The cost to acquire a player like Thompson will be a lot, but you would have five more years at his contract for a player that is still just 27-years old and fills a hole both this season and for the future. He could immediately move John Tavares to the third -line and give the Leafs the most ridiculous star-filled centre-ice set-up in the entire NHL.
The cost to acquire Thompson is likely far beyond what the Leafs could reasonable come up with, but if it is at all possible, they should be exploring the possibility because no team would possibly be able to match the 1-2 punch of Matthews- Thompson down the middle, let alone being able to put Tavares on the ice for another 20 minutes per game.
The Leafs need to match the Carolina Hurricanes in an Arms Race after they recently acquired Mikko Rantanen, and this is pretty much the only way to keep pace.