NHL Rumors: Maple Leafs Discussing Multiple Trades

According to Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet, the Toronto Maple Leafs are trying to create some cap space before the trade deadline and this could include making multiple trades involving some current players on their roster.

Maple Leafs general manager Kyle Dubas would love to upgrade his roster for a playoff push, but like many teams is finding it hard to finalize trades because of cap issues. There's several Maple Leafs believed to be in trade discussions and the list includes defensemen Justin Holl and Travis Dermott along with forwards Pierre Engvall and Nick Ritchie, plus backup netminder Petr Mrazek.

According to Cap Friendly, Toronto currently has $367,000 in cap space and just under $9 million projected for 2022-23. The likes of starting netminder Jack Campbell, along with Rasmus Sandin, Timothy Liljegren, Jason Spezza, Ondrej Kase, and Ilya Mikheyev are all due for new contracts.

A couple of teams Dubas could be targeting include the Nashville Predators and Anaheim Ducks who both have over $20 million in cap space currently and should be working this as leverage across the league. Both the Preds and Ducks appear to be headed to the postseason so they are certainly teams to watch as they have a ton of flexibility to upgrade their roster.

As for the Maple Leafs they will continue to search for ways to create cap space. It may mean a trade like we saw with New Jersey a couple of years back where they basically just gave away Andreas Johnsson over money issues, and either Holl, Dermott, Engvall, Ritchie or Mrazek could be next on the give away list.

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