For reasons no one can really fathom, the Toronto Maple Leafs vastly overpaid Max Domi AND gave him a four year contract, one that bizarrely included limited no-trade protection.
It was a deal that was panned the second it was signed, and not a single person who has actually paid attention to Max Domi's career (instead of the narrative) should be surprised with how badly it's gone, as Domi has struggled to be anything more than a replacement player for the vast majority of his career.
This year has been a full-on disaster. Domi has to be spoon fed ozone faceoffs in order to win his minutes, but this has the disastrous effect of taking those away from Marner and Matthews, meaning the Leafs score less.
Domi a pass-first one-dimensional player who is bad as a centre and far too expensive for a complimentary winger. The Leafs don't have much cap space and so getting out of Domi's contract is basically the key to their entire ability to upgrade before the playoffs.
Maple Leafs Season Rests on Brad Treliving Correcting His Biggest Error
Domi has three goals this year, and they came in three games in a row after opening the season with a 20 game goalless drought. Since those three games, he's gone another 23 games without scoring. This is unacceptable.
The Leafs main targets at the trade deadline are/ should be Noah Dobson and Bowen Byram, both of whom make about the same as Max Domi. The Leafs are going to have to pay a premium to get Domi included in a trade, but there's no other way to make a trade happen.
In fact, the Leafs should be looking at making massive changes during the two-week shut-down. Domi, David Kampf, Ryan Reaves and Calle Jarnkrok should all be moved before the Leafs start to try to add. If they can ditch Timmins and Benoit as well, so much the better.
This would allow the Leafs to clear up to ten million in cap space, though keep in mind that Jarnkrok is on the LTIR and his cap-hit isn't currently counting against the Leafs overall amount.
It is likely unrealistic to expect the Leafs to ditch a third of their team on the eve of the playoffs, but is that any crazier than wasting another year of Auston Matthews Prime? The Maple Leafs cannot enter the playoffs without a significant upgrade on the blue-line and a couple of forward upgrades.
Therefore they must cut before they add. But the biggest decision they have to make hinges on their GM correcting his biggest mistake.