It is not Klingberg all over again because your post assumes it is as simple as just signing both Demelo and Roy and thus we have a good defense. Rafai is unproven and thus we need more depth. Benoit is still unproven as well he has basically one good season behind him. I like him yes, but we can't just assume. We have holes on both sides due to free agency and need to look at both sides to augment the roster the best way. A smart gm will look at Skjej, hanifin, Roy, Demelo, Pesce, tanev, walker etc... and look to get the ones willing to sign for the best fit.
Zadorov I would only look at if his price tag is around 2 million or less. He is a bottom pairing dman in between McCabe and Benoit in my opinion. Not worth the money when we can fortify the roster with better dmen.

So if one of Reilly and McCabe gets injured for a 2-4 weeks or more, you would rely on Rafai jumping up as a top four dman?

Our main two capable dmen are McCabe and Reilly and we are assuming Benoit still wants to resign and assuming Kokkonen and Rafai are capable to jumping. I agree of having a chance for them and of we are able to sign Roy and Demelo as you assumed, I would still look at one unsigned RFA with Defense on the left side as depth. This gives Kokkonen and Rafai competition to make sure they play well. If injuries occur and they showed well in the pre season then can call them up. I hope and think they can do well but we can't just assume it's a guarantee. And also we have Niemela whom is our best D prospect still above Rafai and Kokkonen and he plays on the right side.

Its Klingberg all over again

Zadorov wants 5m


As said before big waste of cap

Benoit wont cost more than 1-1.5m, with McCabe at the 2nd pair LD spot and Benoit at the third again and its getting tiresome 0 need to spend the cap on a LD. The holes on this Dcore for 2024-2025 = Right Side

Rielly-
McCabe-
Benoit-Liligren
Timmins
Rafai


Rafai played 2 games this season to and looked good as a fill in so unproven = wrong (also is not waiver exempt and has impressed Keefe so hes almost a for sure #7)

Ah so you’re the arrogant type of user that can only see his opinion. Gotcha. I’ll make sure to check with you in everything from now on even though I literally know one of the directors of hockey operations for the Leafs that says otherwise but no you have to be right!

As your your evaluation, again they see it as:
Rielly - (hole to filled)
(Hole to be filled) - (hole to be filled)
McCabe - (hole to be filled)
Benoit (as 7th guy)

Liljegren is likely traded in the off-season. They tried moving him close to the deadline in packages for defence but didn’t have any takers.
Treliving wants to overhaul the entire defence if he can. Outside of Rielly, and sometimes McCabe there’s nothing that he loves about it. Benoit has been a nice find but they know he’s not consistent enough to be an every day defender and his skating needs improvement. Hence why they view him as a #7.
As to what you think they talked about at the deadline - you’re wrong. Did they try to improve the right side? Absolutely. But it’s not all they looked at. Not only did they acquire more left handed guys than right handed ones, but they even looked at other lefties too. They acquired Edmundson and Webber (both lefties), and even called about Zadorov after he was traded to Vancouver and rumours resurfaced about him, and they called on Seeler who’s another lefty. But newsflash there bud, all prices on guys were high this year. How many quality left handed defenceman did you see traded this year? Zadorov.. who Leafs tried to get twice but Calgary wouldn’t retain. Edmundson who Toronto acquired. Hanifin who Toronto called on numerous times but the fact that he didn’t wanna re-sign in Canada made it pointless to get him. & Byram who let’s be honest, Toronto doesn’t have anything that Colorado would’ve wanted for Byram anyways. BUT they still made calls on Seeler, Zadorov, and Hanifin all to fill the 2LD spot.
They need a 2nd pair left handed guy as much as they need the righties. If Treliving had it his way he’d likely acquire 5-6 new guys for next season and it’d be a mix of lefties and righties. The unit the team has currently doesn’t fit what he likes in defenders. He’s likes big, physical, rangy guys and this unit isn’t that. Not to mention that after next season Toronto only has Rielly locked up on the left side so they need more guys long term at good ages. They’ve briefly talked to McCabe about if he’d want to extend in the summer but right now he’s stated that he wants term and trade protection and Treliving doesn’t want to give him that. & it’s been rumoured that McCabe might want to go back to the States to play. But that’s obviously early stages of contract talks since an extension can’t be signed till the summer anyways.

But to your original point: you’re wrong. I’m not trying to sound like I know everything cause I obviously don’t. But try not to be so arrogant and stuck to your own opinion - you won’t get far like that.

Where is the proof that the Leafs looked to trade liljegren for holes in the defense. This tells me if you are right that we have one of the worst GMs which makes Shanahan a must fire. To trade away all of our promising young defensemen of hopes will never work. I would agree with trading Liljegren if it brought back a top 2/4 right handed defenseman consistently. Name one guy that we can get in such a trade if you have so much inside information. We apparently looked to trade Nylander for same said Blueline with no takers? Looking at the Hall/Larsson trade tells me hat we wanted a dman better than Larsson for Nylander which if I was GM I would think same thing.
I agree with the need for left handed dman as well as a right handed dman but more because McCabe can play both sides and in free agency/new year for trades we need to look at any way to improve our defense. That is priority and Keefe has shown lately a change of guard with Liljegren. If we wanted to get rid of him, then why over the past 3 years before we put him in he doghouse after the deadline but this year we are trying to get him in position to have a consistent defensive partner for the playoffs. This shows to me hat Treliving is wanting to see what he has in Liljegren for future year as young good controllable Defense is hard to come by especially when comparables to resigns by all experts are stated his salary to be between 2.5 million and 3 million which is a very good started number for what Liljegren has given just this year alone let alone previous years even if he was inconsistent.

As said before but u dont seem to get it and wont continue further

If Brad goes and gets another LD were repeating the Klingberg situation all over again

0 need big waste of cap and time

Rielly, McCabe, Benoit are the LD going to next season. If we do go get its someone to sit in the pressbox or Marlies. RD is the need as there are 2 holes there. Wasting assets or time on LD is pointless

But it's not if we are getting a better defenseman than McCabe. If the defenseman is worse than McCabe then yes. A good GM looks at all options. Are you telling me you think McCabe is much better than Skjej or Hanifin?

I never said there was proof, I said it was what I heard from the director of hockey operations that works for the Leafs so to me it’s pretty reliable.
Liljegren isn’t a future piece in Toronto. Generally when new GM’s come into play they rework the roster to their liking and style because that’s what they were brought into do. They’re not loyal to any of the guys because they don’t draft or trade for them. From day 1 Treliving has talked about overhauling the defence - that’s common knowledge and can be found anywhere. The issue with Liljegren is his defensive play. They don’t like that he’s soft in the corners and in front of his own net. It’s not how Treliving builds his defence and because Liljegren doesn’t excel offensively either, it makes him expendable. I said they talked to other teams about him but it had to be in a bigger package. I didn’t get much, but I know one team they talked about Liljegren to was Philly but Treliving would only do it for a package of Ristolainen and Laughton and one of them came with retention (I’m not 100% sure which one). To which which Philly wasn’t interested in doing.
As for Nylander - idk why you brought him up - but from what I heard they never seriously considered moving him. They listened to calls last summer when they got calls, but the price was high for him. A young, stud right handed defenceman was what they were trying to get but obviously no one wanted any part of that. After the summer ended, they didn’t really take many calls on him and they didn’t shop him. They were focused on an extension.
Back to the Liljegren thing - it makes 100% sense that they’re looking to move him. He’s been playing more to try to increase his value before the deadline but again there wasn’t an offer that Toronto liked, they’re hoping for one in the summer. If you look at the defence in Calgary that Treliving built, Liljegren isn’t the type of guy that he likes.
Weegar - Andersson
Zadorov - Tanev
… that’s a physical top 4. Guys that can clear the net front and take a hit to make a play. Liljegren hasn’t developed into that. He’s a #5 guy at best and he’ll be 25 with over 200 games played at the end of the season which is generally when defenceman show who they really are. So baring any drastic improvement from now till the end of the season, I assume they’ll still look to move him.

& hey you can choose to believe me or not. I really don’t care. I’m just telling you what I know and it’s not opinion but it’s from someone that works for the Leafs. So believe what you will

Ah yup. Thanks for confirming that you’re an arrogant user!

There are no LD this FA better than what McCabe is providing at 2m

6 goals and 18 assists playing 20mins a night can do PP and PK if you need him and when in a jam can play his offside

Its like McNabb with VGK. Again if he does it = Klingberg 2.0 as were just wasting cap for something we didnt need

You mean Benoit who’s been a healthy scratch for 2 straight games and is likely to be scratched again against Carolina? … yeah that really tells me that they think he’s a consistent top 6 guy!

If were basing this on 2 healthy scratch's RIP

Holl was a HS for 71 games under Babcock then came and earned his way into a bigger role and deal under Keefe.

They mean Jack all. Hes an RFA, Keefe loves him, and come 2024-2025 the spots open for him

Ristolainen is not better than Liljegren. Yes treliving likes his big guys but also likes his puck moving defensemen like Andersson and hanifin. A trade for liljegren plus for Laughton and ristolainen plus I did hear and am glad never went through. It would make us worse. This tells me both team could not agree on a package which says liljegren has a strength for treliving to look at which is puck moving. Treliving is probably taking the year to see all the strengths and will judge from there. That is why no trade happened. As for Nylander it was brought up because my most insiders talked about him and the availability of cowan, minten, 1st and Niemela where treliving was snore hesitant over trading.

Ristolinen is basically a guy made for PHI system thats it. Hes a mistake waiting to happen

That cap hit especially for a third pair guy = EW

Liligren is staying or if he does go its in a deal for Parayko or Andersson