Earlier this week, the Maple Leafs announced that John-Michael Liles had been signed to a 4-year contract extension. You could argue that Liles left some money on the table by foregoing unrestricted free agency, but that’s not really the point I’d like to cover.
What interests me about this move, as a Leafs fan, is that we now have 8 NHL calibre defensemen on the roster, 6 of whom are already under contract for next season.
- Dion Phaneuf
- Mike Komisarek
- Luke Schenn
- Carl Gunnarsson
- Jake Gardiner
- John-Michael Liles
Toss in Cody Franson and Keith Aulie, both of whom are entering restricted free agency, and there’s a real logjam on the blue-line.
Odds are that one of them is going to be moved before the start of next season, if not before the trade deadline.
- Phaneuf has a big ticket contract and is the team captain. There’s very little chance that the Leafs would look to move him.
- Komisarek comes with a $4.5M cap hit and his play really hasn’t lived up to that level. From a purely financial aspect, he’d be the most likely candidate to move. The Leafs would have to take on another underachieving player in order to unload his cap hit. As one of Burke’s original golden boys, I don’t think we’ll see Komisarek move until his contract is up.
- As I alluded to a few weeks back, the shine has worn off of Schenn. At this point, I’m sure that the Leafs would move Schenn if they thought he could help get them a big, powerful forward. He’s young, has a reasonable contract for the next few years, and still shows enough flashes of brilliance that someone will think they can get the best out of him. The downside here is that he lacks any playoff experience, so he may not be a hot commodity going into the deadline.
- Gunnarsson has a very manageable cap hit of $1.325M and has turned into a valuable member of the Leafs. I’d hate to see him go, but he might be a useful part of a package for the forward that Burke covets.
- Gardiner is in year 1 of his ELC and he’s going nowhere. I still can’t believe the Ducks gave him up.
- Liles would have been a candidate to move before the extension, but that seems less likely now.
- Cody Franson is my pick as the odd-man out. He’s got a cap hit under $1M and is due for a significant increase in pay for next season. He brings a solid all-around game to the table and has some playoff experience. There’s a great chance that Franson is moved at the deadline.
- Aulie is also going to be an RFA, and that situation figures to play out well for the Leafs. He’s proven that he can compete at the NHL level, he brings a skill-set that the Leafs sorely lack (big, tough, stay-at-home) and the back-and-forth with the Marlies as kept his games played count down, which will help the Leafs in contract negotiations.
At the end of the day, there are too many cooks in the kitchen, and my money is on Franson to be sent packing.
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