Team: 2018-19 Toronto Maple Leafs

Initial Creation Date: Aug. 2, 2018

Published: Aug. 2, 2018

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

Its no secret that the leafs need to do something about their defense. With Forbort, we get a LHD thats essentially a younger Hainsey but substantially better. He would give us somebody that can play 18-20 minutes a night with Hainsey and be a strong defensive 3rd pairing.

We could package a few picks and prospects along with gardiner for Trouba. Most likely, he doesnt stay past the season, this way winnipeg get a defensman capable of putting up 50 points and pairining him with big buff would allow them to cover up for his brain farts. Trouba would pair perfectly with Rielly and give us a top pairing for years to come and someone we can play 22 minutes a night.

That would leave Dermott with Zaitsev where they can play 18-20 minutes a night as well and really round out our defense.

Long term the pairings could be something like:

Rielly-Trouba
Dermott-Zaitsev
Sandin-Liljegren
Forbort

Sucks to give up Brown but with our top three lines, the last line would only be playing 8ish minutes a night, so might as well get better where we need to, plus Grundstrom, Engvall, Leivo, Lindholm would all be capable of fill that role or we can sign a few players for cheap.

The picks is esentially swapping 3rds and downgrading from a 1st to a second but not really a huge price to pay in order to fix the defense. We can offer Trouba 7-8 million long term next year and have the core cemented for a minimum 3-4 years.

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