2 Good Moves and 1 Bad One for the Toronto Maple Leafs + 1 Bad Rumour

The Toronto Maple Leafs had a quiet Friday night, but have been busy ever since.

On Friday the Toronto Maple Leafs had the 23rd pick in the NHL Entry Draft, traded down twice and snagged the 31st pick and two other picks.

They then used one of those picks to trade for the rights to Chris Tanev.

Then this morning they re-signed Max Domi, followed shortly by the re-signing of Timothy Liljegren.

They are likely to sign Chris Tanev and are rumoured to be interested in both Nikita Zadorov and Oliver Ekman-Larson tomorrow when free-agency opens.

2 Good Moves and 1 Bad One for the Toronto Maple Leafs + 1 Bad Rumour

In my opinion, the Leafs have had a so-so weekend so far.

I don't love any of their moves, and I am concerend that they haven't improved their offense or their goaltending.

However, I do like the Chris Tanev move a lot. It's a high-risk move because of how old he is, but otherwise it's solid and the rewards could possibly be huge., Tanev is one of the NHL's best defenseman and if he stays healthy and doesn't decline drastically, the Leafs just got way, way better.

The Liljegren move I also like. I think Liljegren is a better player than he gets credit for being. He has outstanding stats and always wins his minutes. He is a puck-mover on a team that lacks them, and he has some upside. At worst he's a very effective 3rd pairing guy.

He kills penalties, could be a decent power-play guy on a second unit, and is just a generally useful player. He doesn't throw big hits and he doesn't have a lot of offensive upside, so he the type of player that doesn't get a lot of love.

I think it was very smart to retain Liljegren and I've constantly been questioning this entire past week why everyone has assumed he was already out the door.

As for the Max Domi signing, I think it's too long and too much. I realize he's a fan-favorite, but it should be the policy of any well-managed teams not to throw money and term at non-star players who are about to turn 30.

Domi is a fine player and this isn't a horrible move by any means, but I'd rather they had saved the money to put towards a star player and given his ice time to a cheap rookie.

As for the rumour, Darren Dreger said the Leafs are very much into OEL and I think that's a mistake. If he's really cheap, it could be a great move, but I think he'll be overpaid. He was pretty good on the Panthers, but IMO this is more of a safe play than the Leafs need to make.

They have Rielly, McCabe, Liljegren and one assumes Tanev on their blue-line already. Assume one of Kokkonen/Niemela makes it, and Simon Benoit. That leaves them needing one defenseman and I think he should have lot higher ceiling than OEL does.

I would go hard after Zadorov because his ceiling is through the roof. I fully acknowledge that it's a risky move, but safe hasn't exactly been doing the Leafs any favors. It's time to roll the dice on Zadorov and trade for John Gibson.