There is a scenario in which Alex Kerfoot remains a Leaf this season
We truly are now in the thick of the offseason, when most teams are fairly close to finalizing their rosters and the hockey news has slowed to a crawl. For the Leafs, it has been a couple of weeks since their last roster addition and the club presumably remains focused on negotiating a new deal with RFA defenseman Rasmus Sandin before they take any additional steps to clear some space and become cap compliant.
Obviously, the Leafs will have to move someone, as they are currently over the cap by approximately $1.5M and it could end up being as much as $4.1M over the cap if Sandin has his way and gets the Adam Boqvist deal (3 years at $2.6M per season). It is for that reason that many are of the mindset that the Leafs will move Alexander Kerfoot and the final year of his $3.5M contract. But what if the plan is to keep Kerfoot in Toronto this season? It's certainly possible - even if Sandin gets $2M+ on his deal.
The Leafs currently have 22 players listed on their 23-man roster on CapFriendly. Assuming that it will be Justin Holl who is moved, that would drop the Leafs down to a 21-man roster with approximately $500,000 in available cap space. That's IF they plan to utilize a 21-man roster.
The Leafs had reportedly offered Sandin a similar deal to the one that they had already given to Timothy Liljegren (2 years at $1.4M per season). With the gap between Sandin and the Leafs being somewhere around $1.2M per season, it's a reasonable expectation that they'll end up splitting the difference and meet half way. That would bring the offer up to $600K more than they wanted to pay, totaling $2M - the exact amount of the final season of Justin Holl's deal. Essentially, if the Leafs want to keep Kerfoot, they can absolutely afford to - and the longer they go without moving the swiss army knife that is Kerfoot, the more it looks like they intend to start the season with him.
If the Leafs can lock up Sandin for 2 or 3 years at $2M per season, that will put them right back at about $1.5M over the cap with a 22-man roster. All they'll have to do is demote two players who make the league minimum of $750K to become cap compliant. Not only can they become cap compliant by using a 20-man roster, but if they choose to send two players down to make more than the league minimum, like Wayne Simmonds ($900K) and Kyle Clifford ($762K), they can also begin to accrue cap space to use at the deadline as well.
This is just one of many scenarios that would allow the Leafs to keep Kerfoot in Toronto this season. Another would include Jake Muzzin either being moved out or starting the year on LTIR if he is not quite at 100%. In the LTIR scenario, the Leafs would likely also hold onto Holl as well and only move someone once they received word from the medical staff that Muzzin is back at 100%.
Of course, there's no confirmation that anything is even ailing Muzzin at the moment. If his injury history over the last few years is any indication though, there may be something not quite right for him that has been lingering that may need to be addressed sooner than later.
Whatever the Leafs are planning to do with Kerfoot is really anyone's guess. We do know, however, that they have had no qualms in the past with allowing players to play out their contracts and walk via free agency, as we've seen with both Jack Campbell and Zach Hyman in back-to-back years (among others in previous seasons), so it shouldn't exactly be a shock if that's the route Kyle Dubas chooses to go.
| POLL | ||
AOUT 2 | 590 ANSWERS There is a scenario in which Alex Kerfoot remains a Leaf this season Will Alex Kerfoot remain a Leaf this season? | ||
| Yes | 232 | 39.3 % |
| No | 254 | 43.1 % |
| He'll be gone at the deadline | 104 | 17.6 % |
| List of polls | ||
