Leafs Reunite with Lyubushkin

 

Photo From City News Toronto

Well, I planned on going to bed after a win Thursday night against Arizona and just as I was about to call it a night Brad Treliving decided to make a trade. Pierre Lebrun from The Athletic reported that Ilya Lyubushkin was removed from the game tonight where the Ducks squared off against San Jose. The Leafs were rumoured to be interested, and the deal was made shortly after Lebrun’s report.

The deal goes as follows Toronto gets Lyubushkin from the Anaheim Ducks with Anaheim retaining 50% of Lyubushkin’s salary. A third team would be needed, and Carolina would retain 25% of Ilya’s salary helping the Leafs. Toronto would send a 6th-round pick to the Hurricanes. The Leafs also receive unsigned forward prospect Kirill Slepets.

How are Leaf fans reacting to this trade? Well in typical Leaf fan fashion, they are mad. They’re mad because he isn’t the marquee name. However, this trade is a good one for Toronto because Lyubushkin is a decent depth addition for the Leafs. Ilya is familiar with the Leafs market he is familiar with their systems. In his first go-round with the Leafs back in the 21-22 season in 31 appearances he managed 6 points but had 93 hits and 32 blocks. He spent time paired with Morgan Rielly and looked comfortable there. This season on an awful Anaheim team Lyubushkin has 4 points in 55 games, but more importantly he has 112 hits with 138 blocks. With the Leafs blue line dealing with injuries, Timothy Liljegren is day-to-day with an injury and Thursday during the game left the game after crashing into the boards and needing to be helped off the ice likely missing some time. Bringing Lyubushkin back to Toronto helps because he’s a right-handed shot which the Leafs desperately need, and this will temporarily break up the Rielly Brodie defense pairing who had an awful game against Vegas the other night. Ilya is not a player who will make fans say, “ok now we go on a deep run” This is as I said a good depth addition, but the Leafs aren’t finished because they are also rumored to be trying to acquire Matt Dumba from the Coyotes.

The other addition for the Leafs is forward prospect Kirill Slepets who admittedly I am unable to find a lot on but the 24-year-old from Russia is currently playing this season in the KHL with Amur Khabarovsk. In 53 appearances he has a respectable 8 goals and 11 assists for 19 points. I believe the Leafs won’t do much with Slepets after trading for his rights I think it’s highly likely Toronto will deal his rights in a minor trade but that’s a guess.

Again I know a lot of fans aren’t too happy with Ilya Lyubushkin returning but one very important detail they need to understand is that with 75% of Ilya’s salary retained between the Ducks and Hurricanes, the Leafs are paying him $685,500. That is below the league minimum salary leaving Brad Treliving room to make more moves which we all know he is going to do.

So that’s all for this one back to sleep I go as always thanks for reading and Brad Treliving if you happen to read this if you’re going to make another trade, please make it at an earlier point in the night.