Former Leaf believes young Leafs blueliner quietly requested a trade

"That move for Sandin was a savvy one by Kyle Dubas because Sandin and his camp probably called Kyle Dubas yesterday and asked him to move Sandin because he wants to play. What does Dubas do? He turns it into a first round pick," said Colaiacovo.

The writing was likely on the wall for Sandin for quite some time though once he decided he was going to hold out until training camp to sign the same deal that he was initially offered. From a Leafs' perspective, after giving Sandin multiple opportunities in a top-4 role this season and him failing to succeed in them, the Leafs likely saw he was another Travis Dermott, but recognized it early this time 'round and recouped better draft capital than they did for Dermott.

Colaiacovo also noted that it was a smart move by Dubas to move Sandin as quickly as he did given the fact that his value would likely diminish the longer he was the seventh or eighth defenseman. As much as the Leafs were hopeful Sandin would be a Leaf for a long time, with his reluctance to play on the right side, there was nowhere for him to play with Morgan Rielly, Jake McCabe and Mark Giordano all ahead of him on the left side.

It may not have been the most popular move among the fanbase, but it was a shrewd bit of asset management from Kyle Dubas, who also cleared enough cap room between trading Sandin and Pierre Engvall to activate Matt Murray from LTIR and still have some cap space and, now, a 1st round pick with which to conduct further deadline business.