It's so bizarre

Because he has Kahunas. He blocks shots and does anything and everything he can that his skills and age will allow. He's heart and a good mentor.

Then why trade him?

It's a pretty good example that most people are incapable of evaluating players, particularly defensive ones.

And that's fine normally, but we all frequent a website where player eval is important so... yeah

He was trash in the playoffs, he's too soft, 5 million is a big number on this team, it's an easy contract to move because he's UFA next year.

Being soft doesn’t seem to matter to his play. He’s a top 2 defensive defenceman analytically, he blocks a ton of shots too. 5m is a bargain for what he provides to the team and we get astronomically worse on defence replacing him

He’d be loved if he made half as much and 5 years younger

He should be loved as is. He’s doing his job and more, carrying Rielly and Holl defensively

He doesn't clear the front of the net, he never hits, he's a black hole offensively. 5 million for stick checking and shot blocking is too much. You can pay a guy 2 million to do that.

100th percentile EV defence, 99th percentile PK. Whatever is he is doing, it’s working, he’s preventing chances better than almost any other defenceman

He’s overslotted and over played for the lack of talent and depth on leafs, if he was on a better built blueline where he’s insulated a little, back to loved. Possibly Vegas or Florida loved again lol

He's effective in his own way, but I just want the Leafs defence to be bigger, and meaner.

I haven't seen any AGMs with toronto paying to move him, let alone enough to require this much effort to combat

This I disagree with. I think he just got scapegoated for a bad play or two in the playoffs, and as is typical on defence, you don’t notice the good plays on TV. Him and McCabe together make a great defensive pairing. The Leafs defence depth is just fine if Justin Holl wasn’t getting 20 minutes a night

Brodie is not the guy to replace

By no means am I suggesting they move him for the sake of it, there has to be a corresponding move to fill it. TOR needs an injection of skill, mobility, and puck movement into their group of defensemen.

For Brodie, his age, decline in play, and having 1 year left on his deal are reasons I want to explore a trade.


Warning signs are there

This team needs to get some more offence outside of Rielly

Ideally no, but if Treliving wants to reshape the blueline in his own image then that 5 million will come in handy on July 1st.

Put in the wrong clip


The lack of foot speed is really starting to show

There are lots of Leaf fans with varied opinions (and we don’t always agree) but I’m with you - Brodie is very effective & cost efficient. No way we move him. Didn’t have a great playoffs but no Leafs d-pair did other than Reilly / Schenn so 🤷🏻. We should have cap space to add someone to play with Reilly (Schenn returns or other), so Brodie will play in 2nd / 3rd pair which I am absolutely comfortable with

Brodie wasn’t signed for offence, that’s never been his purpose on the team, and you don’t need 6 defencemen to put up points (Low D scoring is an effect of Sheldon Keefe’s system, not our defencemen). Brodie provides something that no other D on the team does. He’s elite in his own zone and elite on the penalty kill. We don’t have anyone else doing that. Without him, we have no shutdown pairings.

As for his “decline,” he just had his best season in the last 3 years according to Wins Above Replacement, which a better metric for judging defencemen than any counting stats or +/-. Not sure what decline you’re talking about that exists in reality. He plays well with the puck in the D zone, uses his body effectively without needing to throw hits.

That 5 million is even more handy when it’s going to TJ Brodie

Agree to disagree

This site doesn't know how to evaluate players beyond looking at points, same thing with Miller (overrated), Petry (underrated), Mantha (underrated), and prolly others

A guess I would point to his best season coming when he only played 58 games this year helped that.

I am not just talking about adding points, which I do think matter
Points by DCore reg season - Atlantic
BOS - 205
TBL - 181
TOR - 166

Conference Finalists
FLA - 204
VGS - 173
CAR- 195
DAL - 179

I want to see this team have some D that can actually move the puck.

cause they dont know hockey