The Toronto Maple Leafs are coming out of the Christmas freeze winners of just five of their last ten games due to eiother a significant drop off in their play, or the numbers finally catching up to them.
The lack of depth on the Toronto Maple Leafs roster is showing in both the top nine group of forwards and the top four defense.
Both Coach Craig Berube and General Manager Brad Treliving will need to make moves and adjustments as they finish out the month and head into January; and we have some suggestions for the the pair to work on which appear all to obvious.
Only two problems stand in the way: a lack of cap space, and Brad Treliving's reluctance to make trades since being taken to the cleaners for Matt Tkachuk several years ago.
Fix the Center Depth
The center depth is was already a complete mess before the latest injury to Auston Matthews. The Leafs are already forced into using Max Domi at centre, and the other day they used David Kämpf to center a line that had Mitch Marner on it.
Ideally, Domi is playing right wing and if a top three center goes down with an injury he can bump into the middle, while the best case situation for Kämpf is that he is centering the fourth line, or better yet, traded with his cap space redeployed more intelligently.
Treliving needs to address the situation and go after a star center that can comfortably back up John Tavares if Matthews is out long term.
The best option, in my opinion is O'Reilly who has two more years left at the same $4.5 million cap hit. He is coming off a 69-point season in his first year in Nashville and has 20-points through 32 games this year, but obviously brings a lot more attributes to a team than just his offence.
Maple Leafs Need to Overpay for a Top Four Defenseman
The top two defenseman on the Maple Leafs this year has been hands down Chris Tanev and Jake McCabe. Ideally, Morgan Rielly finds his game and can fit into the top four but everything we've seen over the last couple of seasons is those days may be gone.
Treliving needs to make the decision to either replace Rielly or add someone that can elevate his game. The former first round pick has been a warrior for years and you'd like to see him have team success in the city so the best scenario is he gets a top end right shot defenseman to play. While there have been rumours about a reunion with Luke Schenn or Ilya Lyubushkin, the better situation is a higher end player to be added to the fold.
The top player to fit this role would be Rasmus Andersson from the Calgary Flames who has been playing over 22-minutes a night over the last four seasons. He has another year after this at just $4.55 million per season, adds a bit of offence and toughness. The Swedish born defender would be a player I'd be willing to overpay to get.
Audition Time is Over
I'd give the benefit to Berube that he is trying to see what he has in his players, but we are now heading into the new year and he should know by now who he needs on the club moving forward and who he does not.
Three players that come to mind that the club can easily move on from are Philippe Myers, Ryan Reaves and David Kämpf. Myers has been unproductive in each of his opportunities and despite being a 6'5" right hand shot defense there is not much appeal to his game.
With Reaves, many can understand the style of play he brought when he was three years younger, but he is just not capable of being a factor in any games. He is losing pretty close to 100% of his puck battles; when he does throw a hit it is well after the play is gone and he looks like a statue in his own end. The fourth line is way more productive when he is not on it.
With Kämpf, he is a capable fourth line center on most NHL teams, but at $2.4 million he does not have enough value over Pontus Holmberg or Connor Dewar in the same role who also make a fraction of his contract. Even with Matthews out of the line-up, I would rather have Fraser Minten in the top nine than see the Czech born center who has yet to register a goal this year.