you almost had us man

I see what you are trying to do here and it is actually quite intelligent.

The way it works (technically) is the leafs will save 9k for every day that Dermott and Hyman are on ltir and replaced by league min 700k player. So every 30 days the leafs save 270k

Build a 22 man roster with a 81.77m cap hit (assuming that Dermott and Hyman miss a month) this roster would include Hyman and Dermott on it for their return. Please also note that I can’t see the leafs operating with less than 300k cap season space.

What I'm not understanding is the facisination of having Barrie and Gardiner on the roster. These two are very similar players and since one was traded for, why bring the other back? Even at a so-called discount.

Leafs are better off with someone better defensively than bringing Gardiner back.

Agreed!
They could potentially toss a bucket on the ice and still be better defensively. Plus the bucket will actually take a hit.

Dubas has a weak blind side to such actions.

There will be more IR relief money to come, like when Matthews misses his usual dozen or more games. And if the Leafs sign Gards, he too might miss enough time to collect IR relief money.

Eh..
I don't believe that at the moment.
Besides, he didn't draft Gardiner so it's not the same love affair Dubas probably has when the organization was drafting the young players which Dubas had a hand in drafting/developing.