One of the unsigned restricted free agents still waiting on a contract is Rasmus Sandin of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Some have suggested that the Maple Leafs could trade the young defenseman, but Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet threw some cold water on that today during the 32 Thoughts podcast.
Like I said a couple of weeks ago, I really don’t think Toronto has a desire to trade Sandin. You look at their depth chart over the next couple of years and basically every defenseman aside from [Timothy] Liljegren and [Morgan] Rielly come off the cap pretty soon. I think they have a desire to keep him.
Friedman notes that some agents believe the leverage for Sandin (and fellow unsigned RFA Nicolas Hague) has been lowered by some of the recent deals signed, including the ones for Michael Anderson (one year, $1MM) and Sean Durzi (two years, $3.4MM) with the Los Angeles Kings. Camp starts in just a few days, meaning Sandin might be absent if a deal can’t be worked out at the last second.
The Leaf Report with Jonas Siegel and James Mirtle: On Toronto Maple Leafs restricted free agent defenseman Rasmus Sandin.
Mirtle: “I think we should keep this one short cause I think we’re going to talk more about Sandin next week. We talked about it on the last podcast. There’s historical baggage. His camp doesn’t want to seem to sign the Liljegren contract (two years, $1.4 million per).
Doesn’t really have a lot of leverage as there are no arbitration rights or anything like that.
And I kind of wonder. My guess is he won’t be at training camp on the first day.”
Siegel: “Well if he’s not signed, he definitely isn’t.”
Mirtle: “That’s what I’m saying. My guess is that he’s not going to be signed. It’s going to drag, and whether or not it drags into the regular season, we’ll see. Because when it does, there’s going to be cap implications of that if it does.”