Leafs have seven roster spots to fill for next season

The Toronto Maple Leafs have their work cut out for them this offseason.

Within the next month, there’s the NHL Draft on June 28 and 29 and free agency opening up on June 1.

And whether it’s internally or externally, Toronto general manager Brad Treliving will have to make a few moves to complete his lineup before the team starts up play again.

Heading into the summer, the Leafs have at least seven roster spots to fill before the 2024-25 campaign picks up in October, with 12 players slated to hit either restricted or unrestricted free agency this offseason.

The combined contracts of Toronto’s departing player are worth around $38 million in real dollars for the team, though their actual cap hit lowers largely due to $14 million of that money being on long-term injured reserve. Matt Murray, Jake Muzzin, and John Klingberg are seeing their contracts come to an end with Toronto once July 1 hits.

Tyler Bertuzzi and Max Domi are the lone unrestricted free agent forwards for Toronto, with both playing this past year with the team on one-year deals.

On the defensive side of things, TJ Brodie, Mark Giordano, Joel Edmundson, and Ilya Lyubushkin are all headed to unrestricted free agency. Meanwhile, both Martin Jones and Ilya Samsonov are set to hit the market this summer.

In terms of restricted free agents, Toronto has four NHL regulars: forwards Connor Dewar, Noah Gregor and Nicholas Robertson, as well as defenceman Timothy Liljegren. The latter two of the four were Toronto’s top draft picks in 2019 and 2017, respectively, while Dewar and Gregor both joined the fold via a trade and free agency this past year.

While we don’t know exactly what the Leafs’ roster will look like moving forward, it’s clear they’ll have quite a few roster holes to sort out before they play another game this coming fall.