I really don’t see them moving Jarnkrok; he had an excellent year - potted 20 goals, played pk, good defensively, can play up the lineup when asked… all on a value contract. More & more, looks like they will be comfortable running a 20 man roster; will mean risking waiver wire for a few players but 🤷🏻

I agree hes the best "swing" forward, and really is key for a 3rd line to have some offense on it, but cap wise and practical reasons I cant see them running an 18 skater team all season, when the main callups are pretty limited, and the only hope is that a "lesser" guy suffers an injury. Theyre also very limited in assets to move at the TDL. And having Giordano (and Brodie/Klingberg) as 82 game guys just isn;t sound, so you have to have a 7th dman, especially one who plays defense (not timmins).

Moving Timmins still doesn;t meet the cap , they're about 1.3mil short with 7 dmen, so who is there that makes 1.3mil or more? (Jarnkrot) Or do they just hope to go through the season with 1 extra skater and no injuries? Its just a recipe for disaster or wearing down the top 6 forwards before the playoffs even begin.

When someone is injured they get an emergency call up and when someone gets hurt longer they can go on LTIR and they have space to bring up spares. It's a temporary issue.

They run a 20 man roster to start the season. If someone gets hurt, they play 1 game short then they are able to use an emergency recall. Emergency recall does not count towards cap. This is the most likely scenario. Jarnkrok’s contract is too valuable. He can play up and down the lineup. If anyone is getting traded it’s Timmins and Lafferty

It all depends on who gets injured and for how long, theres not a lot of upside in the AHL for them. A 20 man roster works fine if the injuries are real short and they're not key guys.

If a top 8 forward or top 4 dman gets injured, whos the callup? And if its one of the big 4, sure it helps to get cap space for later but do they have the assets at hand for a replacement?

A short term 20 man roster is fine but its far from ideal and shouldn;t be the goal, and waiting for an injury shouldn;t be one either. And emergency callup works for a game, then its IR or LTIR which is like 8-10 games or a matter of weeks, but is that what we want to happen?

As far as lafferty or timmins going before Jarnkrot, fine but both probably have to go to create the same space, and again what quality is the replacement?

I get what you're saying, I just think we've seen this before, running so close to the cap with subpar replacements and in a year they have to go for it with half the team expiring I just don;t think its wise to go with so little depth and wear out the top players, because the bottom of the roster is poor.

That's an issue for when it happens. Considering last season the leafs had Muzzin, Rielly, Brodie and Holl hurt all at the same time and didn't collapse should tell you all something.

True, but its not a collapse I'm talking about its about developing a better team within the confines of the present cap situation, that has the ability to do better in the playoffs, which wont happen if there isn;t a deeper team or an over reliance on the top 4 to play huge minutes all season long.

Emergency recall only works for a single game, then you have to IR somebody, which means you might be playing short for multiple games, which exhausts the roster (especially when theres some guys on the team with limitations). For example, You dont want matthews or marner to be playing 27 mins a night too often and you dont want reaves playing 13 or Giordano playing nearly 20, etc.... the goal is to spread the minutes and talent up to the playoffs, not exhaust yourselves getting there

Nah, that's a fallacy. Tampa won by getting a little bit of production from their bottom 6 but was carried by their stars. TO won't win because some 3rd liner, they will win because of their stars. I do think they need to add one more guy to their defence, maybe 2 guys but we'll see how that shakes out.

Starting with a 20 man roster is a horrible idea . Unless they are getting rid of the old players like Giordano, Brodie, Reaves, they can NOT play every day. That was obvious with our defense last year. If you overplay them they will be dead by playoffs again just like last year. Then they add Klingberg who will need to play sheltered minutes no matter what . So Rielly is not good in defensive end and now Klingberg too lol, this defense is a joke. Exposing them in any more ways by having a 20 man roster is a disaster waiting to happen.

I agree with most of this. Seeing how Keefe played his top 4 forwards 20+ minutes a night, that wont change, but isnt good long term in-season. Seeing how Keefe saw the defense as imbalanced enough to 1. consistently play Holl in top 4 minutes, 2. play schenn and holl alot in the playoffs, 3. Giordano looked spent and poor, 4. Decided to healthy scratch Timmins for entirety of playoffs and sat Liljegren for half the playoffs = you have to wonder what he sees in this defense now that Klingberg, Liljegren and Timmins are his 2RD, 3RD, 7th dman and Giordano is his 3LD. He can;t look at that and even think that he only needs 18 skaters.
Keefe and Leaf fans cant look at Robertson and Reaves as good bets for 80+ games, which makes not having a 13th forward a good idea.

While I dont see alot of teams going waiver wire on some of the leafs callups, I do think theres a drop off in the talent on the marlies, which is fine for short callups to cover bottom 6 or lowest pairing, but definitely a problem if theres an issue in top 8 forwards or top 4 dmen.