Brad Treliving Explains Why The Maple Leafs First-Round Pick In 2026 NHL Draft Was Only Top-5 Protected
After a high-stakes gamble on a "win-now" trade, the Toronto Maple Leafs may find that their lack of draft protection carries a devastating price tag.
Video Transcript
But overall, what was the consensus of their approach to this deadline?
Yeah, this was always gonna be a difficult deadline for the Toronto Maple Leafs for the simple reason being that th- this wasn't a good team this year, Katie, and when you're having a bad year, you know, the value of your players is also gonna sink.
So, you know, Scott Lawton's having an awful year.
you know, Bobby McMann was having a surprising good year, but not, not such a good year where you're gonna get a lot for him.
So, you know, end of the day, you end up moving Nicholas Roy, Scott Lawton, and Bobby McMann, and you end up getting a first and a second for 2027, and then a third, a fourth, and a fifth for this year.
That's not gonna help the rebuild or the reset or whatever you wanna call it.
No.
You know, the Toronto Maple Leafs, for next season, they look like they're gonna be an even worse team, on paper at least, the way it's looking right now, than the team that we saw now.
So I don't know what you could've done if you're GM Brad Treliving, anything short of possibly moving a Morgan Rielly, who you'd have to convince, to move, and maybe that's a move that you make in the summer.
You know- Yeah Elliotte Friedman from Sportsnet floated the idea that, you know, if there was a deal that knocked the socks off of, the Leafs, they would've considered maybe moving a Matthew Knies, but again- Right you know, what kind of move was that gonna be?
Maybe a Robert Thomas going the other way.
So, you know, it, it is kind of underwhelming.
You know, the Leafs desperately If they're not gonna make the playoffs, they have to get into a top five spot because their first round pick for this year belongs to the Boston Bruins unless it's a top five protected pick.
So, you know, not a whole lot of optimism right now for the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Yeah.
Yeah, not there.
And I will add Yeah, I will add to that, you know, Oliver Ekman-Larsson is a player- Mm-hmm that I'm sure there was a lot of interest in.
And then if you really wanted to go kind of atomic on this, Anthony Stolarz or Joseph Woll or even Dennis Hildeby for that matter.
You know- Mm-hmm there are teams that are, you know, Stanley Cup contenders that don't have the greatest goaltending situations.
Could they have not have maybe gotten an excellent package including, you know, picks and prospects for one of their goaltenders?
This is, like, the one position they're incredibly strong at right now.
so, you know, like, who knows what offers were made behind the scenes, but in, just in terms of the information we had, it, it felt like there were some deals that were potentially left off the table here.
