TORONTO — The Toronto Maple Leafs, as per tradition, took their final roster decisions right down to the wire to be compliant for Monday’s 5 p.m. ET deadline.
Maximizing cap space.
Rolling the dice on the waiver wire.
Convincing useful vets to sign for six figures.
Stuffing a few good but ailing bodies on injured reserve.
Yes, Brad Treliving squeezed as much as he could from his allotted 23 roster spots and his $88 million budget without trading a single player off his roster this off-season.
Here’s how he did it.
The signed
Do or do not. There is no tryout.
If you’re an NHL veteran and Treliving asks you to try out for the Toronto Maple Leafs, you’re on the squad.
Much like Noah Gregor before them, the PTOs signed by invitees Max Pacioretty (more here) and Steven Lorentz (and here) turned out to be formalities as cap guru Brandon Pridham crunched the numbers to max out the math before the forwards inked cap-friendly deals on the final day.
Pacioretty — the former Montreal Canadiens captain projecting to make his Leafs debut at Bell Centre — agreed to a base salary of $873,770 to keep his current cap hit low. The 35-year-old can ratchet his total compensation to $1.5 million by meeting a couple attainable bonuses ($313,115 for 10 games played and another $313,115 for 35 games played).
Pacioretty’s bonuses will come off Toronto’s 2025-26 cap.
The left winger be asked to prolong O-zone time for the third line and chip in a few of the goals lost when Tyler Bertuzzi signed with Chicago.
“It’s no secret, my shot’s kind of always been my best skill and my best asset,” Pacioretty says.
“At this stage of my career, the most important thing is winning. And I feel that this group has a chance to win. There’s a lot of strong players, and you don’t just want to be along for the ride. You want to contribute.”
Cup champ Lorentz signed on for $775,000 and should have no issue providing full value for that as a penalty killer, fourth-line centre option, and defensively aware role player.
As shown by his pre-season goal Saturday, he can chip in the odd goal, too, by driving net-front.
“I blacked out a little bit there, just knowing that things have come full circle,” the Kitchener, Ont., native said after scoring for his boyhood team. “Coming to this rink as a kid and watching as a young guy and then being able to do that and be able to put my arms over my head, it was a pretty special feeling. That all started with a good hard-working shift, so hopefully there’s more of that to come.”
Captain Auston Matthews says Lorentz “knows his role to a tee” and never strays from what makes him effective in limited minutes.
“That’s really important, to have guys like that. He’s made a great impression,” Matthews says. “Off the ice, he’s got a great attitude and comes to the rink with lots of jump.”
The waived
Treliving crossed his fingers that his waived players squeak through, which they did.
Matt Murray, who is still finding his game after last year’s bilateral hip surgery, is Toronto’s preferred third-string goalie. Murray was signed to a modest $850,000 deal with hopes that he can come up and provide some quality starts in event of an emergency (à la Martin Jones in 2023-24). The Maple Leafs would prefer prospect Dennis Hildeby continue to hone his craft in the AHL.
When we asked Matthews to name a teammate who pleasantly surprised him at camp, the superstar first mentioned defenceman Marshall Rifai.
“I was skating with him a lot the last month or so, but he had (two) games up with us last year, and he worked so hard. You can just see he wants it and just continues to progress,” Matthews said of the undrafted 26-year-old. “I’ve been pretty impressed with him, just the way he plays hard on both sides of the puck.”
Among the cluster of useful players placed on waivers Sunday, Rifai would be a callup option for Toronto mid-season, having been assigned to the AHL’s Marlies.
The injured
Once again, the maxed-out Maple Leafs are diving headfirst into the pool of long-term injured, which will allow them to stash a few significant salaries off the books and prevent them from accruing cap space in the leadup to the trade deadline.
Depth players Jani Hakanpää (knee) and Connor Dewar (shoulder) have both been regulars in practice for a week, but neither participated in a pre-season game. Their injuries will be given plenty of time to heal.
No rush at all on Dakota Mermis (jaw), who hasn’t been skating since surgery.
And Calle Järnkrok (lower body) has been absent from practice since re-aggravating an undisclosed lingering injury in Thursday’s pre-season game.
Though Järnkork downplayed the significance of his injury Thursday morning, Berube has no timeline for the versatile winger’s return.
A slide to LTIR would give Järnkrok 10 games to get fully healthy and allow Toronto to be cap compliant.
One-Timers: Cade Weber, the 23-year-old defence prospect, signed a two-year extension at an AAV of $825,000. It’s a two-way contract in 2025-26 that gets upgraded to a one-way in 2026-27…. A pair of recent re-signings, Bobby McMann and Timothy Liljegren, project to be healthy scratches for Wednesday’s season opener. A tough look for Liljegren, in particular. He received a raise to $3 million and was unable to crack the top six…. Jake McCabe (upper body, day-to-day) was back as a full participant at practice…. Philippe Myers (six-foot-six, 213 pounds every night) impressed enough to make the cut. Berube and Treliving like big D-men…. Prospect Easton Cowan was officially returned to OHL London Monday.
Maple Leafs practice lines on Monday:
Knies – Matthews – Marner
Domi – Tavares – Nylander
Pacioretty – Holmberg – Robertson
Lorentz – Kämpf – Reaves
Rielly – Tanev
Ekman-Larsson – McCabe
Benoit – Timmins
Woll
Stolarz
Extras: McMann, Dewar, Hakanpää, Liljegren, Myers