Leafs announce that they will qualify at least one RFA, have yet to make a decision on another
With the 2022 NHL Entry Draft officially in the books, we now turn our attention to free agency, which kicks off in just 5 days. The Leafs are in a bit of a precarious position when it comes to goaltending, but are set up pretty well otherwise.
The Leafs still have pieces that they can move to free up cap space if things begin to get tight and they also have $10.2M in available cap space with which to work without moving the likes of Justin Holl and Alexander Kerfoot, who would allow the Buds an additional $5.5M in available space.
In terms of RFAs and UFAs, the Leafs have most of their major pieces locked up, with only Rasmus Sandin and a handful of secondary players in need of new deals. One the the Leafs' primary bottom six contributors who has been the subject of much speculation this summer has been Pierre Engvall. Originally, it was thought that the Leafs might look to move on from the lanky forward, leaving him without a qualifying offer and sending him to unrestricted free agency. Well, that no longer seems to be the case.
Per TLN's David Alter, Leafs GM Kyle Dubas has revealed that the Leafs intend to qualify Envgall, which means they'll try to get a deal done to bring him back this summer. One thing to note here is that Engvall does qualify for salary arbitration, so if he doesn't like the deals that the Leafs present him with, arbitration remains an option.
Engvall enjoyed the most productive season of his young career in 2021-22, posting 15 goals and 35 points in 78 games. The 6-foot-5 winger also produced 3 points in 7 playoff games against Tampa this spring.
The former 7th round pick is not going to break the bank, even if he does go to salary arbitration, and is actually a very useful piece in the bottom six for the Leafs. He can play both wing and center, has good speed and a long stride, is strong on the puck and is a reliable secondary scorer. There's really not much to hate about the Leafs pushing to keep him in the fold for next and possibly beyond.
Dubas also revealed that he has yet to make a decision on Ondrej Kase, who played very well for the Leafs, but could not seem to remain healthy for long stretches. Kase is also arbitration-eligible, but unlike Engvall, he has a larger sample size of games to draw from to make his case in arbitration for a larger deal than the Leafs may he interested in giving him.
