The Toronto Maple Leafs are going to go through some changes this summer no matter what -- every NHL team does some tinkering in the offseason. But one move that the team might want to do is trade their star center and captain.
Auston Matthews, when healthy, is in conversation as one of the best hockey players on the planet. Sixty-nine goals like it was nothing, Selke Trophy consideration as the NHL's best defensive forward; you can name a whole lot of recent accolades. But as this business is more and more focusing on the now, the Maple Leafs might want to fully tear it down and change the look of their entire organization on the ice.
Mitch Marner might walk into unrestricted free agency, and John Tavares might join him (but is ultimately less likely to). Those core departures might start a big domino effect of general manager Brad Treliving wanting to mold the Leafs' roster in his image, and according to Daily Faceoff's Frank Seravalli, that could include wanting to trade Matthews and start over.
"How deep should the cuts be? Marner is far from alone in his playoff shortcomings, but he will bear the brunt on his way out the door. What about Morgan Rielly? He was exposed for his lack of foot speed big time in these playoffs, plus that contract will only age poorly. Should John Tavares still be retained on the cheap? And what about Auston Matthews?" Seravalli wrote Monday.
"It’s an interesting thought exercise. The captain has 26 goals in 68 career postseason games; three of those games were two-goal games, so he has scored in 23 of 68 playoff contests as a Leaf. His scoring is nearly cut in half, from 0.64 goals per game in the regular season to 0.38 in the postseason. Here’s the thing: It’s not just the lack of postseason success for Matthews, but also his chronic injuries. If it truly is a recurring back injury for Matthews, as has been whispered, how many of those injuries actually get better over time? There’s a million reasons why they should keep him. He’s a straight up assassin when healthy, one of the most difficult players in the league to replace. But he hasn’t looked like a threat in a while. It’s admittedly very unlikely that Toronto would move on from Matthews – and his no-movement clause would limit their control – but how many questions or thought exercises should be totally off the table for this Toronto team?"
As Seravalli mentions, there are a couple of hurdles. Plainly, Toronto giving up the best player in the hypothetical trade -- unless they do a McDavid-for-Matthews one-for-one blockbuster to end all blockbusters -- would be the biggest thought to overcome. And in addition to all of that, Matthews would have to give them the green light for the deal.
Maybe if there was still an NHL team in his home state of Arizona, he would be more than comfortable heading out there to play in a different environment but why would Matthews give a big ol' giant thumbs up to a deal right now? Especially when his stock might be super low, given he played this entire season dealing with an injury.
No matter what, we are most likely going to see a very different Maple Leafs roster come training camp. Whether it is without Marner, Tavares, Matthews, and then all the hypothetical additions this team makes to go back at it again next spring.