The Toronto Maple Leafs Should Trade Their First-Round Pick For Top Defensemen

The Toronto Maple Leafs Should Trade Their First-Round Pick For Top Defensemen

Jakub Chychrun

The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Ottawa Senators have already been linked in speculative offseason rumours about a blockbuster trade, with Mitch Marner and Brady Tkachuk being the headline pieces.

While that trade could be more realistic, Chychrun is a much more appealing and realistic target.

Sidenote: Why would the Maple Leafs want to trade one of the best defensive forwards in the NHL for the guy that had the second most penalty minutes in the NHL? Would that make the Leafs better? No.

Chychrun's career has been riddled with injury concerns, but he finally showed he could play an entire season in 2023-24, playing all 82 games and tying his career high in points.

Chychrun has one year left on his deal and will likely be due for a pay raise at the end of the season. The Senators are already locked into paying Josh Norris and Jake Sanderson eight-plus million dollars for the next four years, making it challenging to keep Chychrun moving forward.

Chychrun would help the Leafs in many ways. He would be great on the second powerplay unit and provide much-needed puck movement and offence to the blue line.

The concern with Chychrun is that his defensive numbers were horrendous last season, but the Senators' defence was terrible all around, so it is tough to know how much stock to put into that. But what was encouraging about Chychrun's play in his zone is that he ranked among the top 25 percent of defensemen in defensive zone retrievals and retrieval success.

I am no expert on the cost of these players, but this deal would take some work. The Maple Leafs first-round pick would be a great starting point for trade involving Chychrun, who helps the Maple Leafs in all the areas they struggled with last season.