3 former Toronto Maple Leafs who could return on a PTO

No. 3: Matt Martin

It's pretty clear that Brad Treliving respects grit and wants some toughness on his hockey team, which is why he signed Ryan Reaves. However, he never should have signed him for three years and he can redo that mistake by replacing Reaves with Martin.

Reaves makes $1.35M but you can probably get Martin for $775K. Martin has been a great piece for the New York Islanders over the past decade because he's known his role. He's been a solid fourth-line player who can help the energy levels and fight when neccessary.

You don't need much out of your fourth-line guys, but instead just need them to be cheap and likeable. For eight minutes per night, they just need to be somewhat defensively responsible and keep the puck out of their net and you can make a living that way.

In an ideal world, they would also score, but sometimes just being a solid character player with good defense and the ability to shake things up with a big hit is enough.

Martin is 35-years-old, so he's geting near the end of his career, but he's still two years younger than Reaves and can be a cheaper option, so if the Leafs want to go down the road of having an "enforcer type" player, Martin can be effective and he'll be welcomed player in the dressing room, similar to the other two players we spoke about.

That said, one of the biggest problems with the current Leafs lineup is the inability of the fourth line to add any offense to their team whatsoever, so maybe Matt Martin isn't the best fit. Still, he's an upgrade over Reaves and that's something.