Creative Murray trades

Team: 2023-24 Toronto Maple Leafs

Initial Creation Date: Jul. 24, 2023

Published: Jul. 24, 2023

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

I was trying to go around the league to figure out a way to get the Murray contract off the books entirely. I don't think any of these would actually happen, the most likely scenario is that they buy him out, but these are my 4 crazy ideas...

Note: all of these trades have the Leafs waiving Timmins and sending down Gambrell, Holmberg, and Robertson with Bobby McMann making the roster as the 12th forward.

Idea 1: Murray and a 4th to the Coyotes for Voracek and Little
Arizona has an arbitration hearing with Jack McBain coming up so I think they get a second buyout window? They might not because Murray wasn't on their team last year, I'm honestly not sure how that works. Voracek and Little are 8.25 and 5.29 in cap hits but are only 7.5 and 3.5 in real dollars. That's still trading 12 million for Murray's 8 million in real dollars, if they were able to buy him out, that's only 5.333 million in real dollars. I also have heard/read that the Voracek and Little deals are insured, so its possible this doesn't help Arizona and they aren't interested. But the Leafs can move Voracek and Little to LTIR and have just over 600k in cap space.

Idea 2: Murray to the Canucks for Pearson and Poolman.
this only works if the Canucks can buy out Murray. He won't play there and making this trade puts them over the cap. But Pearson makes 4.25 in real dollars and Poolman is 3 million in real dollars for 2 more years, so its 10.25 in dollars and a Murray buyout would be 5 million real dollars and 600k on the cap for the Nucks this year. It's not a great idea for them but it does save them just under 5 million dollars, again, depending on the insurance on the Pearson and Poolman deals.

Idea 3: Murray to the Flyers for Ryan Ellis
Ellis is likely done and that's 4 years at 6.25 and a slightly declining actual dollars is 24 million in actual dollars for the final 4 years. Flyers aren't really a team that tends to care about saving cash so this maybe isn't something they even thought about, but it would save them between 16 and 19 million in cash over the next 4 years if they made this deal.

Idea 4: Murray to the Sharks for Radim Simek, Matt Benning, Ryan Carpenter, and Scott Sabourin
Simek and a 4th to Chicago for a 6th
Carpenter, Benning, and Sabourin on waivers, all loaned to the San Jose Barracuda
This one is tricky. My idea for this was the Leafs sending 4 contracts for Grabner who the Isles were trying to get rid of, they were 4 mediocre prospects but the Leafs needed the contract space. The Leafs are at 45/50 contracts right now, the Sharks are at 47/50. Sabourin, Carpenter, Benning, and Simek all won't factor into their roster this year and probably not ever, but they may have intended for Carpenter and Sabourin to help with their AHL team, so when they clear waivers, the Leafs can send them to San Jose anyway, loaning players to different AHL teams happens all the time. Plus, the trade allows the Sharks to take more contracts back in the Karlsson deal. It's a stretch, but it might make sense. It could also be different guys, I just took the 4 oldest/worst players whos contracts I could add up to approximately Murray's cap hit. Leafs should be able to dump Simek for much less than they would have had to give up to get rid of Murray.

More than likely, we will hear about them buying out Murray today, hopefully not before I finish typing this, just wanted to get an idea for what the other options were.

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