The Toronto Maple Leafs have missed the playoffs for the first time in since 2016, or rather the first time in the Auston Matthews era. Not only did they not make the playoffs, they were a bottom five team with just 79 points, a 29 point drop from 2024-25, and ahead of only the Calgary Flames, NY Rangers, Chicago Blackhawks and Vancouver Canucks who are all in full rebuilds. In this article I will look at how they got here and plot a path forward for the franchise with some important lessons to be learned on the process and patience required when rebuilding a franchise.
The Kyle Dubas Years
On May 11, 2018 Kyle Dubas was named General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Dubas inherited a team from Lou Lamiorello who just finished with a 49-26-7 record and a roster of young talent including Auton Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander, Zach Hyman, Morgan Rielly, plus Nazem Kadri who was in the prime of his career. The team had just drafted Timothy Liljegrenin 2017 and in 2018 Dubas drafted Rasmus Sandin and Sean Durzi. Without doing a thing the Leafs right now could have Matthews and Kadri as their top two centers, Marner, Nylander, Hyman as their wingers with Morgan Reilly, Sean Durzi, Rasmus Sandin and Liljegren on defense. That would be a pretty solid core to build from.
Instead of doing nothing and letting the team grow naturally through the rebuilding process, on July 1, 2018 Dubas made a splash and signed John Tavares to a monster 7 year, $11M/yr cap hit contract and in doing so attempted to fast track the rebuild. In isolation, no one can say that Tavares has been a bust in Toronto or that the contract has been an inherently bad contract. Tavares has been very good and has lived up to the contract and even earned himself an extension. However, the contract set a new standard for what the Leafs organization was willing to pay for top tier players and therein lies the problem.
Five months after Tavares signed his contract, Nylander was signed to a $6.96M cap hit contract. Two months after Nylander signed, Auston Matthews signed for $11.6M salary cap hit. Seven months after Matthews signed, Mitch Marner signed for $10.9M cap hit. With those signings, the Leafs had committed a large portion of their salary cap space to four forwards. However, in a world where Tavares was worth $11M per season, it was hard for Dubas to argue that these players were worth less than what they received. The Tavares’ contract set the standard, the others fell into place.
What made the situation even worse though is that Dubas paid top dollar and didn’t get max term in return, as most young star players were getting. Nylander, Matthews and Marner only signed for six, five and six seasons respectively. As a comparison, in August, 2017 Leon Draisaitl signed for 8 years at $8.5M. Edmonton got Draisaitl for longer term at less money.
Having committed big dollars to Tavares, Matthews, Marner and Nylander the Leafs were now in a position where they were struggling to fill out a roster around those stars under the leagues salary cap. They needed to free up salary cap space and sent a first round pick to Carolina to rid themselves of Patrick Marleau’s contract. That first round pick, which turned out to be Seth Jarvis. Nazem Kadri became a luxury they could no longer afford to keep as a third line center and moved him to Colorado for Tyson Barrie and Alexander Kerfoot.
Then the bad luck came in the form of COVID freezing the salary cap which meant they could not get out of their salary cap problems via salary cap growth. However, they still viewed themselves as a Stanley Cup contender despite having not yet won a playoff round and the chasing the cup began. At the 2021 NHL trade deadline he traded a first round pick for rental Nick Foligno. At the 2022 NHL trade deadline they traded wo seconds and a third for Marc Giordano and Colin Blackwell.
Then in 2023, having still not won a playoff round, Dubas went all in at the trade deadline. He traded a first, a second, a third and a fourth round pick for Ryan O’Reilly and Joel Acciari, another first and second round pick for Jake McCabe and Sam Lafferty, and a third round pick for Luke Schenn. He also traded Rasmus Sandin for a first round pick and Pierre Engvall for a third round pick. While this gave them their first playoff round win in 18 years, it was not enough to save Kyle Dubas’ job.
The Brad Treliving Years
Next up in the GM chair for the Maple Leafs was Brad Treliving. He inherited a team that had just made it to the second round of the playoffs, had a core of Matthews, Marner, Tavares, Nylander and Rielly and high expectations. He also inherited a team in which Auston Matthews and William Nylander only had one year left on their contracts and just two more years for Marner. Treliving was now responsible for navigating the problem that Dubas created by not getting full term contracts for their young stars while also living with the expectations of being perennial Stanley Cup contenders, despite having one just playoff round with the current core of players.
Treliving was able to get Matthews signed for $13.5M cap hit in August 2023 but only for a four year term as players were starting to be more reluctant to sign long term due to the expectation of a significantly rising salary cap. William Nylander signed for $11.8 million cap hit for a full 8 year term. It slowly became clear though that Mitch Marner would be the most difficult to re-sign.
At the 2025 NHL trade deadline Treliving went all-in for one last playoff run with Marner on the roster. Treliving traded Fraser Minten along with first and fourth round picks for Brandon Carlo and Nikita Grebenkin along with a first round pick for Scott Laugton. The Leafs went on to lose in the second round to eventual Stanley Cup winner Florida Panthers after which Mitch Marner decided not to re-sign with the Leafs.
The loss of Mitch Marner was critical as he was their primary puck mover/playmaker and is one of the best in the league in that role. He was also an excellent defensive player. He was, in my opinion, the Leafs most important player because he did things no other player on the roster could do. He was moving the puck up the ice at 5v5. He was the primary playmaker for his linemates, Auston Matthews and Matthew Knies. He was critical to running the powerplay. The Leafs had plenty of players that could score (Matthews, Tavares, Knies, etc.) but very few that could drive the play and elevate the players around them. Marner was their only top six forward that could do that. Losing Marner was, in my mind, the primary reason for the Leafs failures in 2025-26 and not being able to replace Marner’s puck moving and playmaking abilities was also Brad Treliving’s failure in his time as GM of the Maple Leafs.
Again, we can compare Marner directly to the team average in a single chart. The Leafs are better at generating inside shots by their forwards when Marner is on the ice. Marner is not the problem and the Leafs will miss him if the Leafs don’t/can’t re-sign him.
— David Johnson (@hockeyanalysis.com) June 4, 2025 at 3:51 PM
Here are Treliving’s NHL level forward/defense acquisitions (trades or signings) since joining the team as GM.
- John Klingberg – July 1, 2023
- Ryan Reaves – July 1, 2023
- Max Domi – July 2, 2023
- Tyler Bertuzzi – July 2, 2023
- Simon Benoit – Aug 28, 2023
- Bobby McMann – Aug 28, 2023
- Ilya Lyubushkin – Feb 29, 2024
- Joel Edmundson – Mar 7, 2024
- Connor Dewar – Mar 8, 2024
- Chris Tanev – Jun 29, 2024
- Oliver Ekman-Larsson – July 1, 2024
- Philippe Myers – Jul 2, 2024
- Max Pacioretty – Oct 7, 2024
- Steven Lorentz – Oct 7, 2024
- Jani Hakanpaa – Sep 11, 2024
- Scott Laughton – Mar 7, 2025
- Brandon Carlo – Mar 7, 2025
- Mattias Maccelli – Jun 30, 2025
- Nic Roy – July 1, 2025
- Joshua Dakota – Jul 17, 2025
What do most of these players have in common? They have little to no puck moving and playmaking talent. They are defense first players, or they are shooters/finishers, or they are grinders and role players. None have high end offensive playmaking talent. None come close to replacing (in whole or in part) what Mitch Marner did for the Leafs. The exceptions are Domi, Maccelli and Oliver Ekman-Larsson who have some playmaking ability, but in the case of Domi and Maccelli are wildly inconsistent and haven’t shown themselves to be reliable top line players.
I think Tree is a good GM that I think over compensated for what he envisioned were the Leafs flaws when he joined the team. I will say that I enjoyed my time working with Tree in Calgary and hope he gets another chance to be an NHL GM somewhere.
— David Johnson (@hockeyanalysis.com) March 30, 2026 at 10:22 PM
The End Result
Building a Stanley Cup contending team from scratch is really hard. It takes time. A lot of time. So you need a plan and you need to stick to your plan. The hardest part is having patience and knowing when your team is ready to go from a very good team to ready to seriously compete for a Stanley Cup. The Leafs were a really good team for a long time, but they never showed they were ever really ready to be a Stanley Cup contender but the GMs acted like they were, trading away prospects and picks before they were truly ready to make the jump from very good team to Stanley Cup contender.
This year could have been very different if Tavares wasn’t signed setting a new salary structure for the team before the Leafs young stars were signed long term.
This year could have been very different if Dubas was able to sign the young stars to full 8-year terms after their rookie contracts like most young stars have done in the NHL.
This year could have been very different if Dubas hadn’t traded away so many first round picks for playoff rentals when the team hadn’t yet shown they were ready to go deep in the playoffs.
This year could have been very different if Treliving had recognized the likely need to replace Marner and spent trade capital to acquire a skilled replacement rather than shooters, finishers, defensive specialists and role players.
This year could have been different if Treliving hadn’t traded Minten and a first for Carlo and Grebenkin and a first for Laughton.
However, they are where they are. That is with Matthews, Nylander and Knies in their primes of their careers to go with a lot of aging veterans with limited skillsets on long term contracts, and a lack of prospects and draft picks.
The Current Roster
Here are the players signed or under team control heading into next season.
Forwards
- Auston Matthews – 2 years @ $13.25M, age 28
- William Nylander – 6 years @ $11.5M, age 30 (on May 1)
- Matthew Knies – 5 years @ $7.75M, age 23
- John Tavares – 3 years @ $3.9M, age 35
- Max Domi – 2 years @ $3.75M, age 31
- Dakota Joshua – 2 years @ $3.25M, age 29
- Steven Lorentz – 2 years @ $1.35M, age 30
- Easton Cowan – $873K, age 20
- Matias Maccelli – RFA, age 25
- Nic Robertson – RFA, age 25
Defense
- Morgan Reilly – 4 years @ $7.5M, age 32
- Jake McCabe – 4 years @ $4.5M, age 32
- Chris Tanev – 4 years @ $4.5M, age 36
- Oliver Ekman-Larsson – 2 years @ $3.5M, age 34
- Brandon Carlo – 1 year @ $3.485M, age 29
- Simon Benoit – 1 year @ $1.35M, age 27
- Philippe Myers – 1 year @ $850K, age 29
Goalies
- Joseph Woll – 2 years @ $3.7M, age 27
- Anthony Stolarz – 2 years @ $2.5M, age 32
- Dennis Hildeby – 2 years @ $850K, age 24
Outside of Cowan and Hildeby above, the only quality prospect in the Leafs organization is defensive minded defenseman Ben Danford. There are a few other guys that may have a chance to make it, but none that you would pencil in to the Leafs lineup anytime soon.
Moving Forward
I don’t see many/any Leaf fans preaching patience but I will here. The next GM cannot come in thinking he can fix everything overnight. They cannot make any rash roster decisions. In fact, there is no reason to do anything rash right now as the majority of the roster is under contract or under team control beyond 2026-27. There is also no benefit to tearing everything down this summer and tanking when you don’t have your first round pick next season (and maybe the following season too). Additionally, the majority of the roster are coming off down seasons so by selling now you are probably selling low which is never a good thing to do.
While patience is important, there are open roster spaces, particularly up front, and available cap space to spend. The next GM needs to maximize every opportunity they can by acquiring undervalued and underperforming players on other teams or via free agency. They need to take swings on players that haven’t broken out yet or look for struggling players that need to re-establish themselves. The key here is to look for bargains. Buy low on players that are young enough to help through a rebuild or that you can sell off for picks and prospects at the trade deadline or next summer after they have rebound seasons. The Leafs need to do something similar to what Pittsburgh did with Anthony Mantha, Tommy Novak, Egor Chinakhov, Justin Brazeau, Parker Wotherspoon, etc.
There is also the Auston Matthews question. Whether this team needs a full rebuild (which means not being good for another 7-8 years) will come down to whether Auston Matthews wants to re-sign in Toronto. Barring Matthews saying he wants to be traded this summer, there is no need to rush making that move. The Leafs have time here. If needed you can make a Quinn Hughes in-season type trade or wait until next off season when he can sign an extension with his new team (if he won’t extend with the Leafs). The key is to get him healthy, put him in a position to succeed to either get him to re-sign or to maximize the return should he ask to be traded. Unless they are totally blown away by an offer, there is no need to make a move this summer.
With that said, this would be my plan for a new GM this offseason:
- Take swings on underperforming players, either through the UFA market, or cheap acquisitions as other teams are looking to shed salary, but make no long term (more than 3 years) commitments to anyone over age 28. The Leafs management team needs to be looking for buy low players that you could maybe sell high at the trade deadline or next summer or young players that haven’t broken out yet and their teams are giving up on (possibly non-qualified RFA’s). Focus on puck moving and playmaking skills but any player with skill is worth a gamble. The Leafs have some available cap space to spend, it must be spent wisely.
- Test the trade market on your older non-core players, but don’t be desperate to move them for the sake of moving them. There is no urgency to sell low on guys who underperformed last year. You are better off trading them for a second round pick at the trade deadline than for a 4h round pick now and recklessly spending the salary cap savings on UFAs.
- Plan for next season to be the season you decide whether Easton Cowan is a center or a winger. If you see him as a center down the road, he needs to be a center now. Make him your 3C and let him run with it and see how he does. If he performs well, bump him to 2C and see how he does. The Leafs need to find out what they have in Cowan. Is he a center or a winger. Is he a top 6 player or a middle six player.
- Within the context of the above, focus on fielding the best 2026-27 team you can. The objective has to be to convince Auston Matthews to re-sign. Matthews is only 28, even if the Leafs went through a more significant rebuild, he can still be a contributor when they come out the other side. Matthews, Nylander and Knies can still be part of the core 5 years from now. They of course all have a say in the matter, but whatever the path forward is, the outcome is better if Matthews is open to being a Maple Leaf for the rest of his career. It will be difficult to maximize the return if he openly demands to be traded so that would be the worst possible outcome.
I want to be clear, by preaching patience it does not mean that I am not recognizing the fact that the Leafs window to win has quite possibly closed and that a more significant rebuild will be necessary at some point. That may very well be the case. I am just stressing that that decision does not need to be made this summer resulting in selling low on players. The focus solely needs to be on bringing more skilled talent into the organization as cheaply (in terms of acquisition cost) as possible be they NHL players, prospects or draft picks and worry about a potential tear it down rebuild later if it comes to that.
Coaching
I have deliberately not mentioned the coach in part because I think there were roster makeup challenges he had to deal with and in part I don’t know what the internal dynamics are between the coach and the teams star players. These things matter when evaluating the coach. At the same time, the coach needs to be on the same page as the GM. He needs to coach to maximize the growth of the younger players on the team and that almost certainly means adjusting teams playing style and tactics. I have my doubts that Craig Berube is the right guy for that job but that should be for the next GM to decide after talking to the players and Berube.
In Summary
To sum things up, if there is a single reason for the current state of the Leafs it would be that a series of mistakes of impatience occurred through the Auston Matthews error. Rather than let a very good young core grow together Leaf GMs chased the dream of a Stanley Cup run before the young core was ready and then kept chasing the dream, trading picks and prospects and signing aging veterans to the point where they are no longer a very good team and have very few prospects and draft picks in the pipeline. It was a lost opportunity for the Leafs to break their Stanley Cup drought. Lost because of lack of patience on the part of Leaf management. It’s time to be patient, and not rush the process.